Mags' War, Part 5
by thankyoufinnick
Summary: "I've got your back, whether you like it or not." Finnick and Johanna fight: sometimes each other, sometimes themselves, always the Capitol.
1. Chapter 1

_Good thing Cashmere's in Three,_ is Finnick's first thought as he walks to the council chamber. This isn't officially a trial, just a debriefing, but with an armed escort all the way from the Three-Four border, it feels like one.

Finnick resists the urge to fiddle with his shirt sleeves and instead focuses on keeping his face in order.

The oak door swings open, and one of his blue-uniformed guards stands holding it while Finnick walks in. Finnick nods his thanks, wishing he recognized any of his escort, and enters the chamber. To his relief, the guards remain outside when the door closes.

As he's heading toward his seat at the table, Finnick runs smack into Brine. They exchange a complicated look. They're the last victors here, with Rudder in Three, Annie in hiding, and the rest dead. He can see that same recognition flicker in Brine's eyes.

So of course they have to rib each other.

"Lookin' good." Finnick glances approvingly up and down Brine's body, where muscle is starting to replace fat again. "War agrees with you."

"Can't say the same for you," Brine retorts, grinning back. "I didn't recognize you without the makeup."

"That's because you never came down to the docks and did an honest day's work."

Brine's face finally betrays discomfort, until Finnick takes pity on him and gives him a real smile. Brine returns it, almost involuntarily.

Then Pearleye's stern voice breaks in. "That's enough," it scolds, like they're in school or something. "Settle down. We have important business at hand."

Finnick takes his seat thinking that maybe, however the next hour plays out, he has one ally.

"All right," Pearleye opens, putting a pen to the top of her notepad, "we're all extremely busy, so I'm going to keep this short. Mags?"

"Made her own choice," Finnick answers in the same snappy tone, as soon as he's realized that's the entire question.

"Cashmere?" Pearleye asks at the same time as Foam bursts in, "It was your idea!"

Finnick looks up the table, knowing that her husband would still be alive if he hadn't lost his head over Annie. "Sending tributes to the Quarter Quell to get Katniss out alive was my idea, yes. But Mags approved it, and everyone else, including you, hashed out the details. It's a little late now for second thoughts."

"Cashmere," Pearleye repeats.

Finnick raises his eyebrows. She really is in a hurry. "Took up arms against Capitol troops in District Thirteen. Did propaganda for us. Now in District Three, with Rudder."

"Couldn't bring her home?" Brine teases.

Finnick draws a blank at first, then remembers that everyone thinks Annie's hiding in Four. It's best if Brine assumes he's trying to keep her and Cashmere from meeting. "What can I say?" he returns with a deliberately naughty look. "Rudder said he was short-handed." Finnick trusts that Rudder will tell the same story if he's questioned.

"Plutarch," Pearleye continues, writing furiously as she goes.

"Militarizing District Thirteen. He's still gathering the resources, but I don't think it'll be long before Thirteen's as hierarchical as the Capitol. That man has _contacts_."

"What about the Mockingjay?" former mayor Grebe demands, impatient.

"Yes, was it worth it?" Foam pleads.

Keeping his disappointment firmly to himself, Finnick answers flatly, daring anyone to challenge him, "If you ask me and Mags, yes." His feelings don't matter. What matters is Katniss rallying the districts. "When I left, they were making plans to move into the food-bearing districts and organize the rebel forces there."

"When you left? How long did it take you to get here? It's been months since the Games! And they're still just making plans?"

"I told you, Plutarch's putting together a whole army out of the population of several districts. That doesn't happen overnight."

"It did here," Brine points out.

"Two districts. And how much territory do we hold?" Finnick counters. "They're operating on a much larger scale."

"So Katniss is working for Plutarch now?" Pearleye asks.

Finnick avoids the topic of the internal conflicts in Thirteen. "She's working with him. We don't need her here. We need her there. And speaking of territory, I suggest we do something to get in contact with Seven, if we don't want to be cut off entirely from our allies in the east."

Pearleye shakes her head. "Ideally, yes, but you said Rudder told you he's understaffed. We can't even really spare the troops to hold Three, except that we need the technology so desperately. Seven is rioting but disorganized, and we don't have any contacts."

Finnick's stomach plummets. Two months, and no contacts? Johanna's still a prisoner?

"No word from your girlfriend?" Brine echoes his thoughts. "I mean the one in Seven?"

Finnick should get into the banter, but his heart's not in it, and he's home, where—he hopes—he doesn't have to fake it. He just gives Pearleye a look, asking for news, and she shakes her head sorrowfully.

"We tried, but we were only able to bargain for one prisoner to be released. Victors come with a higher price tag than Peacekeepers, even officers."

Finnick keeps his face neutral through the line about price tags, which he knows is innocent but comes like a kick to the gut. It's true, in any case.

"We settled on Peeta," Pearleye continues, "because you and Mags seemed to value his life the most. We got him back last week."

Finnick's so busy desperately trying to think of a way to get Johanna back that wouldn't be so stupid and reckless she wouldn't kill him for it afterward that at first he misses what Pearleye said. "Peeta's—here. No, you mean he's in Twe-Thirteen?"

"He's here in high security," Pearleye continues, "being examined. We suspect there's a trap, but we don't know what. For all we know, he could have a subcutaneous time bomb planted in him. But there's no way we could have ensured he was released anywhere else. Now tell me, was that the right call? We didn't have a lot to go on."

Annie's in Three, and Peeta's here. Finnick can't keep up. He shakes himself slightly. "It was the right call," he says, pushing through the feeling that he's betraying Johanna. "Katniss had every reason to believe we were out to kill her. I was trying to earn her trust by protecting Peeta. Johanna Mason was already with us."

"'With' some of us more than others, I bet," Brine quips.

"I have an idea who we could trade." Finnick shoots a glare at Brine. "She's been through twice as many arenas and doesn't need this shit."

"Enough," Pearleye snaps, "you can do this on your own time. So you think if we get him back to Thirteen," she asks Finnick, "Katniss will be more...cooperative than she was in the arena? Or is that all past us now?"

Finnick can't decide whether to be more annoyed with her for expecting Katniss to dance to their tune, or with Katniss, for shutting him out as an ally. "I think it would be the best thing for her," is all he says. "I'm happy to escort him back the way I came."

"Not yet," Pearleye says. "I need you here. I need you visible."

If Katniss's and Plutarch's reaction to his public persona is anything to go by, Finnick's forced to agree. "At least let me visit him."

"After he's been vetted."

"He just got out of captivity!" Finnick protests. "He needs to see a familiar face."

"Not if it's the last face he sees," Pearleye says with finality, and Finnick can't argue with that either. He'd better get to work rehabilitating his image at once, then. Then he'll have more freedom.

"I will need a contact in Thirteen, though. You said Plutarch is setting up an extremely hierarchical structure? Do you have recommendations on who to send?"

"Well," Finnick starts, "he is retired military. Many of the Gamemakers were; it's not an unusual career path."

"I didn't know that." Pearleye makes another note.

"Speaking of which, you'll want to call him General Heavensbee to his face."

"Are you serious?" Grebe asks. "Who does he think he is, President Snow?"

"Well, honestly, I think he's aiming to match the Capitol in legitimacy, so he kind of has to set himself up as a foil, if he wants to be taken seriously. On the subject of being taken seriously, if you want your contact to be, send someone older, no sense of humor, very by-the-book fellow."

"Lucretius, then, maybe," Grebe suggests, but Pearleye is busy giving Finnick a piercing look. "Did you leave because victors weren't getting special treatment?"

Finnick quells his surprise. If Mags groomed Pearleye as her successor, he should expect the occasional unexpected insight. He needs to keep that in mind, if he ever wants to keep any secrets from her.

"Not like here," Finnick answers, with a sidelong glance at Brine, who didn't even know a revolution was in the works, but now that it's broken out, is automatically included in the inner circle. "No, I take that back. Haymitch was getting special treatment."

Pearleye raises her eyebrows. "What in the rolling sea did you do to get yourself taken less seriously than Haymitch Abernathy?"

"Sacrificed my reputation for ten years in order to get you all the information you asked for." Finnick smiles brightly. "I hope it's been worth it."

Pearleye may not like him, but she's too blunt to be cruel for the sake of it. "It helped," she says in a clipped voice. "Well, your orders now are to report back here at five o'clock every morning for propaganda videos, and spend your days as visible as possible. Dig trenches, patrol the streets and the shipping lanes...anything and everything to show you're one of us. After I've gotten enough propaganda out of you to start with, I'll send you further afield."

He grins. "You could use some help with the speechmaking, it's true. It's not just me, I've heard people talking, and believe me, 'uninspiring' was the kindest word they used."

Pearleye shakes her head. "It's a matter of demographics, that's all. Believe me, there's a crowd that my style resonates with better than yours. Work on your image and we can start appealing to the..." She pauses. "The younger crowd."

"Wow, you're getting soft," Finnick teases.

"The hotheaded crowd," she retorts.

"Better."

"Special enough for you?"

"It's a good start," Finnick allows, not letting on how pleased he actually is with this assignment. Years ago, it had been his idea, not Mags', for him to start working every job he was qualified to do or could pick up quickly, as visibly as possible, after he came back from his Victory Tour. He never told her that it helped him with the insomnia.

After the interrogation is over, Finnick gets a briefing on what's happened in his absence. He doesn't mention that he got a rundown on the first two weeks from Rudder—nor the unexpected kindness that Rudder did him in giving him the news from Four before he started his interrogation. In his years of gathering intelligence, Finnick's learned the value of seeing the same events from two different perspectives. Who includes what details, what do they leave out, what motivations do they attribute to whom?

Pearleye, for instance, avoids giving a blow-by-blow account of the Reaping Day Battle, which she had to escape as early as possible to begin the district takeover. Instead, she gives a broader, Four-wide perspective. Who's growing what food, how the shelters are distributed, how they've positioned the antiaircraft defenses to try to protect a dense population in a thin strip of land, which is every bit as hard as it sounds.

Finnick questions the others closely on the food-growing situation. It's better than nothing, but he's still left shaking his head at the end. "I still say we need to bring food down through Seven."

"We'll eventually have to do something," Pearleye says, "but we're too overwhelmed now. We still have a window of time before we have to ward off a famine. I'm going to send someone, maybe Lucretius, maybe Arthur, to District Thirteen, and we'll work out logistics. In the meantime, we all have far too much work to be doing, and the council is dismissed. Finnick, stop by my office with me now. I have something I was asked to pass on to you."

Taken by surprise just as he's getting to his feet, Finnick wonders what to do. He was hoping to slip out without anyone remembering about the armed escort, and now he has to wonder if she's pulling a Plutarch on him.

But no, she has all these plans to keep him busy.

Under supervision, maybe, he thinks cynically. Since when does Pearleye trust him?

What choice does he have, though? Rudder's not here, and Finnick's sure Brine would love to see him kept on a tight leash.

Tense, furious, giving in to the temptation to wonder if Peeta was really worth losing Mags, Finnick yields to the inevitable and follows Pearleye out the door. She's not going to have him killed, and there's nothing he can't talk his way out of, given enough time.

He goes on the offensive as soon as they cross the threshold. "What the hell was that?" he mutters with a nod at the guards standing on the other side. "You know I'm loyal," he seethes, "you know how I spent the last ten years-"

Pearleye looks around. "What is this?"

Cliff stands straight. "You gave us orders to see that Finnick Odair came to headquarters as soon as he was spotted."

"Armed and breathing down my neck the whole way?" Finnick demands. "Too short-handed to do anything with Seven and yet you can spare three soldiers to follow me around?"

"No," Pearleye says, bemused. "I left the border troops with a standing order to see that you came straight here, but the wording must have been more open to interpretation than I realized. You're dismissed," she tells them briskly. "Get back to work."

They snap salutes. "Yes, ma'am."

"We need to figure out whether they're supposed to salute civilians or not," she murmurs to herself as she and Finnick continue down the hall. "The line gets a little blurry." Then she speaks up. "You have to realize your reputation-"

"Oh, I know," Finnick grits through his teeth. "I know my fucking reputation. I've done nothing but work at it since day one." Sometimes he feels like he's running in place. Then he relents, because Pearleye didn't order a guard on him after all. "I was going to ask what was so wrong with my reputation that you thought three was enough," he jokes.

Pearleye snorts and refuses to humor him with a reply. "While we're on the subject of orders, do you need more to go on, or did I give you enough in the meeting?"

"Pitching in everywhere, staying visible? It's what I've been doing all along, so unless you think I did a bad enough job that I need to be micromanaged, that's enough."

Pearleye makes a noncommittal sound, but she concedes, "You're lucky that's what Mags said."

Finnick sucks in a deep breath, pushing back a wave of love, pain, and need. "What did she say?" he asks, trying not to let any of it show.

It takes Pearleye a couple minutes to balance openness against the risk of an ego trip. "That I'd get the biggest payoff out of you if I told you what I needed, and gave you leeway in deciding how to go about it."

It is _ridiculous_ to want to cry with relief at Mags interceding for him from beyond the grave, and beyond ridiculous when the entire problem is not being taken seriously. Finnick gets his mask in place as they approach Pearleye's office.

She swipes her hand over the scanner by the door, and it opens. "Come on in." Crossing the floor to her desk, Pearleye unlocks one of her drawers, digs around in it, and hands him an envelope. "This is yours."

Finnick finds himself hoping it's a last message from Mags, even as he tells himself he knows better. _She couldn't write, you know that._

 _Well, maybe she wrote it before the stroke,_ the voice of hope argues.

It may be unreasonable to feel cheated when his name is printed carefully on the front of the envelope in a handwriting he doesn't recognize, but it's still with involuntary disappointment that he begins reading the message on the slip inside.

 _Your father and I saw you on TV, in the broadcast from 13. We're not sure how to take it, but if this is how you're making up for your behavior, we want to let you know we'll accept an apology and we'll be glad to let the past remain past._

 _Your cautiously optimistic Mother._

The note ends with instructions on how to reach them in the wartime upheaval.

Finnick laughs brittlely. It almost doesn't hurt.

 _Oh,_ _you'll_ _accept an apology. Why couldn't this have been from Mags?_

He drops the letter in Pearleye's shredder on the way out.


	2. Chapter 2

"We'll be there soon," the young man in the blue uniform tells Johanna.

"You said that already." Johanna tries to snap, but her dry throat makes it come out more of a croak.

She wasn't this afraid when she went into the arena. At least there, she could fight back. But if District Four finds out how she's betrayed them, she'll _deserve_ whatever they do to her.

Johanna looks nervously at the driver, hoping her face doesn't give her away.

Maybe she should just keep it to herself. Why go out of her way to tell everyone how weak she was? But no, if the Four leaders don't find out she betrayed their plans to the enemy, she can't undo any of the damage she did.

It seemed like such a good idea at the time. Talk before they tortured her, when she had some control over what she said. Tell enough truth to convince them, and twist it just enough to minimize the impact of the secrets she was giving out. Then go free, join the rebels, and make herself useful.

But now that she's free, Johanna hates herself. Why couldn't she have died before she talked? She doesn't even have the excuse of breaking under torture. She barely got a taste of pain before she caved and agreed to cut a deal.

Now the only way to do any kind of damage control is to warn District Four of what she's done, let them change what they can to try to stay one step ahead of the Capitol.

As the car she's in speeds toward its destination, she's torn between dreading having to tell Rudder what she did, and wanting it over with. Sitting still just leaves her brain stuck in endless circles, and she's never liked putting things off, but she wishes like hell she had better news to report.

If she was going to cut a deal, she needed to make it worth it before she admitted it, and she's not sure she did.

She was hoping to mobilize District Seven into organized action against the enemy, but she ran up against one wall after another. Finally, she ran into her self-imposed deadline. She has to fess up _now_ , or never.

So she set out for District Four hoping to convince them what she's accomplished is enough to justify what she sacrificed. But on her way, she ended up in District Three, which has been mobilized by Four troops with dizzying efficiency. It gives her some hope that they might win the war, but none at all about how they're going to treat her. She wouldn't even blame them if they wanted to convict her of treason.

Rudder's not going to be impressed by the little progress she's made in Seven. Look at what he's accomplished here. And her Games won't give him much confidence in her potential. What did she do? Look pathetic, squeak out a couple kills—one of them District Four—run away from Scorpios? Her only kill this past year came after the cameras stopped broadcasting. While Rudder's famous for being one of only three victors to take out every single one of the other Careers in his arena. When he emerged, he even held the record for the most kills, until Brutus seized it.

Even Finnick didn't manage that. His Games were full of hiding, sneaking, walking away from-

Johanna freezes. Replays Finnick's Games in her head.

Walking away from threats. Cuting off fights in the middle to escape by jumping into a river. Waiting them out. Living to fight another day.

 _Because he was fourteen!_ she tells herself.

 _Because he was outmatched,_ another voice counters.

Deep in thought, Johanna peers out the window. She can just make out some trees as they fly by in the darkness. Maybe Finnick is who she needs to be talking to. He always seemed impressed by her Games. He went to the trouble of digging up her phone number because he wanted her in his alliance.

 _Because he was impressed by Katniss._ Johanna's lip curls.

 _Because he was worried you could kill Katniss. Then you proved you could._

That settles it. She's going to tell Finnick, if she can. If he's still alive.

* * *

Rudder's a foot taller than Johanna, and he won't sit down when you talk to him, either. Johanna stands with her hands on her hips, facing him with the same concentration she brought to killing his tribute all those years ago.

"You're in command here?" she opens.

"Military command," Rudder answers, all business too. "Mayor Augustus is in political command, as much as anyone is."

"If I share information with you from Seven and the Capitol, will you be able to use it?"

"Most likely. What've you got?"

District Seven is in rebellion. Lumber production has ground to a halt, and there are riots everywhere. But the district is still under Peacekeeper occupation, and there's no organized militia to resist them. Casualties have been high.

Rudder is nodding, like this is a familiar story. "District Three was in the same state when I arrived with the troops from Four. I'd send you a detachment too, but I'm understaffed here already, and I'm not authorized to operate outside the bounds of Three. You'd have to talk to Pearleye."

Johanna struggles to catch up. She wasn't asking for military support. Never in her wildest dreams did she imagine she could get it. But if she can-! "Where is he?" she asks, trying not to show her excitement.

"She's in Four. She's our mayor. The civilian leader now that we've seceded."

She? Johanna has to meet this woman who tells a district what to do and they actually listen. But first she has to explain how she made it out of captivity.

"I cut a deal and fed them misinformation." It's true, she's just leaving out the part where she also fed them all the information she had. "Like I knew Mags was dead, so I emphasized that she was the mastermind, and the rest of you were her catspaws. I said she used people without letting them know."

Rudder snorts. "You think that's misinformation."

Johanna stops, wrong-footed. "But you knew there was a revolution."

"Eventually, yes." He doesn't look too impressed.

"Well, I didn't know if they had Finnick! I didn't know who they had, I just knew it was safe to throw Mags to the wolves. I was trying to protect you, ungrateful wretch."

Rudder lets a little amusement show. "No, you did the right thing. That was smart thinking."

Johanna's barely mollified. She may have talked, but she did at least try to mislead her captors.

"So, do they have Finnick? Did he make it out?" Rumor has it he did, but she knows just how far she can trust rumor.

Johanna tries not to hold her breath while she waits for the answer.

"He did. He's in Four now, working for Pearleye." Rudder gives her a surprisingly understanding look. "He'll be glad to see you."

Johanna hopes so, when he hears her news. She doesn't have many friends. Or any, come to think of it.

"You're heading to Four soon?"

"As soon as I can, if that's where I can get what I need."

Rudder nods. "The border's locked down. I'll sign the papers authorizing you to pass through, and I'll put you on the next ship south. Meanwhile, you're high-profile enough I believe I'll let you wait in a secure facility with some of the other key players in Three. It's not safe, but it's the safest place in the district," he tells her.

Johanna narrows her eyes.

"I know you're a warrior," Rudder answers that look. "But you're on an important political errand without backup."

"I suppose." Johanna resents being protected and resents not being protected.

When she's got the paperwork in hand, Rudder sends her with an escort to the secure facility. "Remind Pearleye that Three and Seven share a border, and it'll make my life easier if we have troops on the other side."

"I'll remind her," Johanna says. Her heart thumps. They're going to give _her_ backup. Maybe.

 _No. They'll do it. I'll make it worth their while._

* * *

Now from dreading her arrival in Four, Johanna's chomping at the bit to get there. She needs to meet this Pearleye, talk to Finnick, get military suport, get back home, organize the resistance movement, and then start fighting the actual war.

Which of course is why she's stuck cooling her heels in top security with a bunch of eggheads.

To pass the time, she offers to pitch in with the ongoing excavation, but they're not even using shovels, they're using explosives and large machines, and she's not trained in any of them. So she paces in the common room.

Cashmere shows up during the evening meal. Seeing her so unexpectedly, Johanna's instantly transported back to the arena. Her blood pressure spikes, her palms break out into sweat, and her hands clench around an invisible axe.

Then with an effort of will, she pushes the memories back where they belong. "Hmph. So you made it out."

Cashmere only nods, collects her food, and flees back to her room without a word. Johanna's left at the dinner table with only unfamiliar faces, unsure whether that's better or worse.

They recognize her, of course. "I'm Silica," the man next to her introduces himself. "We watched you protect Wiress and Beetee."

Johanna makes a sound deep in her throat. "She's dead."

"Not your fault," the engineer across the table contradicts. "Nor what happened to Beetee. I'm Shannon, by the way."

Someone else mutters something, and Johanna sits up straight, eyes narrowing. "What did you just say about Finnick?"

"Well, _he_ 's the weapons prodigy," whoever it is says more loudly. "He should have been able-"

Johanna's spoon comes out of her bowl of mush and slams onto the table in her clenched fist. "You do not criticize what goes on in the arena before you've gone in and done it yourself! He had orders to protect Katniss and Peeta over anyone else, and so did I. You think I got captured because I _wanted_ to draw the Careers off Katniss? You think Mags is dead because Finnick _liked_ Peeta? You shut the fuck up, all of you."

They do, all of them, and Johanna seethes into an uncomfortable silence.

"Did Beetee make it?" she finally asks. "I wouldn't know, I've been in a prison cell."

"He did," Silica answers. "We've been in communication, and he's made some propaganda appearances."

"You're welcome," she snaps. "Who else made it? I'm totally out of the loop."

Katniss. _Knew that. Can't miss the Mockingjay even in Seven._ Cashmere. _Yes, saw her._ Finnick. _My one ally._ Enobaria, victor of the Third Quarter Quell. _Fine. Bitch. I was victor._ Peeta, exchanged in Twelve. _Guess one of us is important._

"Stupid question," Shannon says, tentatively. "You have been checked for trackers, right?"

Johanna's mouth moves wordlessly, as the whole room falls silent. "I'd remem-" But as soon as she starts to say it, she knows she's the stupid one. How much time did she spend unconscious in the hands of her torturers in the Capitol? It felt like not enough at the time, but they could have done anything to her, and she would never know.

"Can we detect it here?" Silica finally asks into the tension.

"I can detect metal," the woman named Joule answers, "but if there's no metal component...I think she'd have to go to the Hub."

This is how Johanna finds herself lying on a table being scanned. She doesn't feel any more tense than she has been constantly since the Quarter Quell was announced, or afraid; what she feels is _stupid_. It took her a month since her release to get a grip on the situation in Seven and travel down her to start telling District Four how she betrayed the revolution, and not once did it occur to her that the Capitol had an ulterior motive in letting her go.

 _Did they do a_ _lobotomy_ _?_

"Nothing," Joule announces, and the tension in the room only shifts, it doesn't abate.

Suggestions and arguments fly, while Johanna sits with her head in her hands and tries to think how to make this situation better.

"Hub, then?"

"Is it safe to travel?"

"Better now than later. It's still dark."

"Maybe they won't see this as any different from any other place she's stopped."

"We have until they realize there's nothing aboveground for a mile."

"They can't detect the signal from down here."

"They'll know where it stopped. And we're going to show up as a magnetic anomaly."

"If they can get a 'craft past the gunners."

"We have a little time," Joule says. "Who wants to take her to the Hub? I can notify the military that we have a potential security breach."

"Should we evacuate, all of us? We've barely started fortifying this bunker—we've been relying on secrecy."

That's a good question.

"If she doesn't have a tracker, it's a big risk. We have nowhere to go, and that would be a lot of people to be moving around above ground at the same time. We could all get captured."

"Call in the military first. If there is a tracker, and they're closing in on us, leaving now just exposes us."

"Can we jam the signal as we transport her?"

That stops the conversation in favor of rummaging. "What, we have no tinfoil?"

Eventually they conclude it would be extremely easy to jam the signal, but not in the next five minutes using the minimal equipment they were able to bring into this shelter.

"I'll take her," Shannon decides. "I know the way. Joule, let the military know."

"I should have thought of this," Johanna murmurs as Shannon is sealing the bunker entrance behind them.

"Too late now," Shannon shrugs as she rises. "Follow me."

Johanna hasn't felt this subdued since she got off the medication that had her fighting through a fog every minute of every day. There's nothing to say, nothing to do, nothing she can change. It feels like waiting in the Justice Building after her name was called.

The Hub turns out to be a car ride away, with the sounds of explosions coming from altogether too close.

"We haven't been able to drive them out of Three like they did in Four," Shannon explains as she drives. "There's still fighting on the ground."

"I can stay and help fight them," she offers.

"That's not up to me. Thank goodness."

The Hub turns out to be a complex of buildings where assembly takes place. They pick their way in the dark through broken glass and rubble, Johanna trying to follow Shannon's lead and not flinch visibly at each explosion. There was shooting when she left Seven, and fires, but no bombing.

Johanna undergoes another scan. This time, it lights up, over her right buttock. Johanna grabs her knife from her belt and starts attacking it, digging around and welcoming the pain, just as the technician tosses the device in his hand to the side like it just bit him.

"Why did you bring her here?" he cries.

"We don't have equipment where I'm based," Shannon explains. "We're doing design only for now. And they already know where the Hub is. You have a military guard on this place?"

"Of course," he answers, not looking much appeased.

"I need to talk to whoever's in command, now."

This is important enough to go all the way up to Rudder. Or maybe he just happens to be in this part of the district today.

Johanna faces him with more humiliation than this morning. Is she still forgiven? How much more information can she give away before she's another Peeta, protected because no one can bring themselves to put her down?

Rudder takes this news with grim resolution. "I didn't think of it either. Let's get you on the next ship to Four. Pearleye needs to know about this, and I don't want to broadcast it over the wires. I'll summon a ship, a boat if need be."

That's true, he didn't think of it. _Of course, he didn't have a month..._

"Shannon, I can't give you orders, but I'm asking you to escort her. She doesn't know the way, the bunker is compromised, and I'll need all the troops I can spare for the evacuation."

"Of course." Shannon hesitates. "And once Johanna's on board?"

"Ideally, you board with her. If you want to come straight back from the bay, I can't offer you protection today. Once you get to Four, we can work something out."

Shannon is wide-eyed, but without a lot of options. "I'll do that, then."

Just another life turned upside down in the wake of Johanna's collateral damage.

Once at sea, Johanna clings to the rail on the pitching ship and stares out at the sea, ignoring everyone to wallow in her misery. Despite all her commitment, all her impatience with anyone less focused than herself on "getting shit done," she's accomplished nothing. First she couldn't even hold out under torture, and then she brought danger into Three. Who knows who's dying or captive now in the bunker she left behind.

Nothing but a liability.

All at once, Johanna retches over the side of the ship.

Someone walks up behind her, and she turns her head away.

"Seasick?" It's one of the sailors, sounding sympathetic and amused at once. "Almost everyone from Three's been through the same thing the last couple months."

"At least I can swim!" she snaps.

"First time on the water?" He holds out his hand. "My name's Buck."

"No! I've been on boats." Then Johanna hesitates. She's never sure whether she'll look stupid if she introduces herself or if she doesn't. No, not after the Quarter Quell. He'd better know who she is.

"First time at sea, then? Try looking at the horizon. Sometimes it helps."

Grudgingly, Johanna swallows and tries.

"So, I was wondering...you were teamed up with Finnick in the arena. Is he for real?"

Hearing the question that's been echoing in Johanna's mind for so many years throws her for a loop. "What do you mean?"

"He comes on television and says he's been spying for the revolution this whole time." Buck sounds like he's open to the idea but needs more convincing. "And the mayor and a whole bunch of politicians make speeches backing him up. But he's always been a little hard to swallow, if you know what I mean."

Johanna stares out at the horizon, where the grey sky meets the grey sea, and tries to sort out what she knows for sure.

There is a rebellion. Four is crazy organized from everything she's heard, and seen. The young man next to her is in uniform just like everyone else on this ship, and the soldiers she saw stationed in Three. There was a plan to get tributes out of the arena. Finnick came and protected as many people as he could.

 _I guess he's real._

"We were spying in the Capitol for years, passing each other information," she finally tells Buck. "Finnick got a lot more done than I did because he was better at pretending."

Because he was more committed. She may not be drop-dead gorgeous like some people, but she has the confidence to draw eyes if she wants. With the right stylist and the right attitude, she could have made herself useful before she talked under torture and led the Capitol straight to a secret rebel hideout.

But the one thing she's never lacked is animal courage. So when she finds herself at the new headquarters in Four, she follows her escort into Pearleye's office like she's charging into a bear den.

The first thing she does is briefly outline the lumber situation in Four. She's been able to keep the rioters from destroying most of what's lying around, and she can probably arrange for it to be transported out, but organizing the jacks, drivers, and sawmills into resuming production for Four while trying to fight off Peacekeepers is not happening without outside military support.

Pearleye is shaking her head. "We don't need lumber, not that badly. We captured a few naval ships and can make do with what we have, at least for now."

"But Finnick said.." Confused, Johanna lets her voice trail off while she tries to make sense of the dribs and drabs of information she's picked up over the years.

"Finnick said we were short on lumber?" Pearleye's equally confused. "Maybe he wanted a backup plan in case our moles weren't able to get us proper ships."

"He kept asking about the roads and trains from Seven to Four," Johanna remembers. "I joined the transportation crew at the border with Three so I could get him as much information as possible. We didn't have the freedom to go into a lot of detail about how he planned to use the information."

"Aha. Then I know what he was getting at." From her desk drawer, Pearleye pulls a sheet of paper. Craning her head, Johanna can see that it's a map, and Pearleye gestures for her to pull her chair around the desk next to her.

"You see, for a long time, there's been a debate about how to get food without the Capitol delivering it. Food that provides nutrients that fish doesn't. Finnick was always in favor of encouraging all the districts to cooperate, so that we can get food shipped here from the same districts it's always been shipped from, by train.

"There's always been a lot of skepticism that we could get that much organization going. But if you look at the map..."

Johanna nods. "One and Two are enemy territory, and they separate you and Three from the eastern districts. The only way to get a train through friendly territory...is us."

"I suspect that was his interest even then. The first thing he did when he came home a few weeks ago was bring a train of food to prove it could be done. Well, he proved it could be done once, but it doesn't exactly scale up to feeding a whole district."

"But if Seven cooperates..." Johanna supplies.

"Then it might," Pearleye agrees. "We'll still continue trying to grow our own food, and we're exploring the option of transit by sea to the south. But with you as our ally, I'd be willing to give this plan another try."

"So you think it's worth sending troops to Seven to help keep the supply lines open?"

"It's something the council will have to debate on," Pearleye tells her. "I'll let you present your case in a few days." She smiles. "And welcome to Four."

* * *

Finnick's feet drag him toward the bomb shelter Johanna's working on like a criminal going to his execution. She has more reason to hate him than Katniss. _Get it over with, and just be glad Annie's safe and she's forgiven you for Mags._

But even steeling himself for a Katniss repeat, he can't quite bring himself to step into the crucible. He finds the group she's working in, grabs a shovel, and joins them on the far side of the shelter from Johanna.

Then he's immediately swarmed by everyone demanding to know where he's been, what's going on in the rest of the country, what Pearleye is up to, whether Annie's okay, whether he was telling the truth, how you can be supporting a rebellion while fucking everyone in the Capitol...

It's overwhelming enough to distract him, and in the back of his mind he's just bracing himself to look up and find that Johanna's made tracks to another shelter far away. That'll answer his question, and he can move on without having to see the look on her face.

Which means he's startled to feel a shovel swat the backs of his legs at the same time as a voice demands, "You avoiding me, Four?"

Finnick whirls in disbelief to find Johanna standing behind him. Trying to quell the rush of adrenaline at being snuck up on at the same time as he prepares to defend against a surge of accusations, he sucks in a deep breath, puts the sentence about the newly formed navy he was about to utter to the side, and enters a fourth simultaneous conversation. "No, I was giving you the chance to decide if you were avoiding me."

Johanna waves her shovel imperiously at the other shelter-builders milling around them. "Everyone who wasn't in the arena, step aside. We have a lot to catch up on." Then she ignores everyone who ignores her and shoehorns her way in beside Finnick, raising her voice to override anyone who's still carrying on previous conversations with him. "You look like shit."

"No makeup," Finnick quips automatically. _Don't get too excited. She probably just wants to rip you a new one before she stops speaking to you._

She looks him up and down searchingly. "But not as awful as you could look."

"I'm sorry," he says, hating himself for not having more than those useless words to offer her. He's checking her out at the same time, being less obvious about it. She's thinner than he remembers, but it's winter, so she's wearing too many clothes for him to see if she's carrying any more wounds. At least she's on her feet.

"That you're alive?" Johanna starts attacking the trench with her shovel, leveling the steep side.

Realizing they're going to be here for a while, Finnick resumes his work beside her and gestures to everyone to let them talk. "You weren't supposed to be left behind."

"I was supposed to be the nearest tribute to Katniss when the rescue came?" she says knowingly. When he looks surprised, she gives a satisfied nod. "You better believe I was smart enough to figure that out. Eventually. Not when it was happening, no, but I've had plenty of time to relive that night. It was supposed to be your group, at the tree, that was taking the risk of being left behind."

"That plan didn't survive five minutes of contact with, well, reality," Finnick apologizes. He shouldn't have turned his back on Peeta, even with Beetee down.

"So it was supposed to be you?" she challenges.

"I didn't have too many choices about how we distributed the teams, but I figured we, especially Beetee, would have a better chance of disabling an enemy hovercraft than anyone else. Didn't count on Enobaria taking on Beetee over me and Cashmere. Everything went to hell, Johanna, and I'm sorry."

She makes an inscrutable sound deep in her throat. "Well, I'm in Four now, working out the alliance with Seven. I got stuck with the civilians digging bunkers in my downtime. I don't mind the digging, but have you ever been in a shelter with the bombs going off?"

"A few times," Finnick answers, recovering from the whiplash change of subjects. "If you're saying it's easier to be in the front lines, I know what you mean. I've spent the last week stationed with the anti-aircraft artillery units in the desert, and it's way easier."

Johanna looks at him with a hunger bordering on hatred that takes his breath away.

"You can come with me next time," he offers. "Or I can put in a good word for you to be allowed out there."

Her face lights up. "What about tonight? It's easier to ask forgiveness than permission."

"That is my motto," Finnick agrees, "but Pearleye personally summoned me back and didn't tell me why."

"Oh, that's just for the meeting we're having about Seven and Four and what we need from each other. She wants you here for that, and that's not for another two days because she's having to summon everyone out of the far corners of the district—I'm sorry, independent nation."

The news is positively dizzying. "She wants me for international alliances?"

"Yeah, now can we get there before blackout begins?"

Riding high on this revelation, imagining what it was like for Johanna to huddle underground with strangers hoping not to die, Finnick makes an impulsive decision.

"If we leave now and I pull a few strings...Let's do it."

"Forgiveness!" Johanna crows as she tosses her shovel on the ground.

Laughing, Finnick shows her the way.

Being on the move, weaving through the streets, gives him the opportunity to have a more personal conversation. He keeps having to smile at everyone who recognizes him, and try to shut down interruptions politely, but at least he doesn't have to worry that someone's eavesdropping on the whole conversation.

"Johanna, I don't know what I did that you're still speaking to me, but if you want nothing to do with me now that we're not undercover, I promised you before that I wouldn't take it personally."

"Hey. Are we fighting this war or not?"

"Of course, but there're a lot more ways to fight now without being seen in public with me. I'll still back your alliance in meetings, but you don't have to feed the rumor mill any more in order to be included in the action."

Johanna rolls her eyes. "It's a little late for that. How's that been working out for you, telling everyone you weren't really a playboy? They believe you?"

Finnick makes a sheepish face, and she grins at scoring her point. "Occasionally. You believe me, right?"

"Hmph. I didn't know whether to believe you before this. But yeah, I do. Volunteering when Four didn't have to send any tributes at all is hardcore. So I guess I can't ditch you after that. But I do like your delusions that anyone will believe I'm not fucking your pretty little brains out."

Finnick chuckles. "If you can live with it, I certainly can. But you don't hate me?"

Johanna looks at him with an eyeroll to the side and up. "Don't push it, boy wonder."

But she's going to find out eventually, and he doesn't want the blow when she finds out he was keeping it a secret, so he pushes it. "You didn't hear about Peeta being rescued?"

"That you guys negotiated an exchange for him?"

"I wasn't here for that decision," he says quickly.

"You would have rescued Peeta anyway," Johanna says, resigned. "But you were betting on me to make it out of captivity alive, the same way you would have bet on me in the arena, right?"

"My money's always on you, but-" Finnick's about to say _You deserve better,_ but something tells him that's not what she wants to hear. "Actually, where is my money? You survived. I say that makes you a victor."

He's right, that's what she needed to hear. Johanna lifts her chin. "I demand a second crown."

"We should all get crowns! I'll propose it at the meeting."

She laughs, and Finnick's heart soars just to know that he has one friendship that his reputation and his ruthlessness haven't cost him.

"You didn't happen to hear who died because I survived, did you?"

"You mean like Conch?" he retorts. "Doesn't matter." Finnick would never tell her this, but the fact that even Johanna fucking Mason isn't totally immune to survivor's guilt makes him feel a little better about his own.

"If it was someone you cared about," she pushes.

"What, more than Mags? If I'm not holding her against Peeta, why would I hold anyone against you? I almost got Annie killed myself."

"Trying to save her. Risking your own life. Not risking her to save your own life."

"Well, I'm engaged to her. You're not."

"What if it was Cashmere?" she blurts. "You saved her. You must have trusted her at least a little bit."

Finnick freezes. Johanna doesn't know Annie's with Cashmere. And she's right, he cares about Cashmere too. "You saw Cashmere?" he asks carefully.

"Yeah, in Three. Did you not know she was there?"

"No, I did. I introduced her to Rudder. It was better for her than being in Thirteen or Four. Is she dead?"

Johanna shrugs. "If she is, it's my fault." Then she tells him about her tracker.

He can just imagine it. Annie not leaving her room, Johanna never knowing she was there. And he, Finnick, has to keep his poker face in case she's still alive. "Well, if Rudder evacuated the shelter, I trust that he knows what he's doing." _Rudder knows she's there. Rudder would prioritize her. He already did, once._

"Finnick?"

And now Finnick has to not run straight to Three. He has to trust Rudder and do his job.

"Sorry, just thinking about the logistics in Three. I'm sure Rudder's got this one. Even if not...look, I wasn't captured, and I didn't keep you from being captured. And we didn't rescue you. There's nothing anyone has the right to hold against you, least of all me."

Johanna looks only partway convinced. Finnick's sure they'll have this conversation again, but for right now he's run out of things to say that might help. Maybe shooting down drones will make her feel better, and it'll sure as hell take his mind off Annie.

The only resistance they meet on the way is boarding the truck out to the front lines. In a blue-uniformed crowd, Johanna's civilian clothes stand out.

A soldier steps in front of her with hand held out. "Are you authorized to be here?"

"I'm authorizing it," Finnick says easily, before Johanna's straightening back and clenching fists turn into words. "She is a victor, you know."

The soldier gives her a closer look. "District Seven? You're with us?"

"That's why I'm here, brainless."

The insult gets Johanna narrowed eyes, but she's waved on.

"Victors get special treatment." Finnick winks as he and Johanna settle into the truck. It's crowded, so he pitches his voice low.

"Is that a rule?" Johanna teases.

"It actually kind of is. Mags made the rules, and now Pearleye's stuck enforcing them."

Johanna's head whips toward him. "Shit." She mouths, so that no one else can hear, "Is Annie okay?"

Finnick just nods. He hopes it's still true, but he's touched by Johanna's obvious relief.

"All right, I suppose that's why you don't look more like shit. How about our Mockingjay? Was it worth it?"

Whey does everyone keep asking this? He only has the one answer, but it doesn't pack the same punch coming from him to Johanna, who went through more than he did.

"For me, yes. For Mags, since I speak for her, yes. I can't speak for you."

Johanna presses her lips together. "Hard to argue with Mags. So how come you're not there keeping her alive?"

Being friends with Johanna Mason is a lot better than being rejected by Katniss, but not much more comfortable. "She doesn't want me around. We're lucky she agreed to be part of the revolution at all. She's not happy about how she got manipulated into it."

"How...she...got...manipulated...into...it," Johanna repeats, one word at a time. "You mean, the part where she's alive and her boyfriend is alive, and she left a trail of blood and ruin in her wake?"

"I mean the part where she's seventeen, she has no home, and she feels responsible for what happened to her district, and for everyone who died or got captured keeping her and her boyfriend alive. I mean it when I say we're lucky she's as committed as she is."

"Remind me again why you can't be the Mockingjay? You seem pretty committed. I bet you'd be more cooperative."

"Are you serious?" Finnick laughs through the bitterness. It hurts to think of how much more cooperative he would be than Katniss. "I am just barely not getting lynched as a collaborator. I come out here shoveling as publicly as possible because I need to convince everyone of whose side I'm on. I spend every day moving from dangerous task to menial task to dangerous again, and nights appearing in propaganda shoots with the ranking officers and politicians, in hopes that it won't take another ten years before my own people trust me again.

"The rest of the districts? Johanna, I've considered having plastic surgery just so everyone stops recognizing me."

Dumbfounded, Johanna pulls up her jaw. "See, that's what I mean about cooperative. You're willing to do whatever it takes, aren't you?"

Finnick shrugs. "There's not much I'm not willing to do. Plastic surgery is nothing compared to what Mags did." The truck comes to a halt. "All right, we're here."

Johanna hopes out as fast as she can. "Bring it on."

* * *

"Better?" Finnick asks Johanna. The sun is rising on them, both bleeding superficially, covered in dirt from the explosions, and Johanna absent-mindedly sucking a finger where the nail tore off.

"Yeah," she gasps, leaning against the wall. And she does feel better, steadied at least. "Is it like that all the time here?"

"On the border? Pretty much. We try to keep it from being like this in the inhabited areas, but we're not always successful. You're not getting bombed in Seven?"

"No. Not yet," Johanna adds cynically. "Am I needed for anything now?"

Finnick shakes his head, once. "We've carried all the wounded, secured all the prisoners. I was going to ask if you wanted to find a private spot for a quick chat."

Johanna stares at him through bloodshot eyes. "How are you still going? I could sleep for a hundred years."

"But you don't have insomnia. Right." Finnick snaps his fingers. "We'll talk tomorrow, then."

"No," Johanna says, reluctantly. She's filled with dread, but at the same time, this is what she's been angling for. Better that this happen on her terms. "Find me a spot where I can sleep with some privacy, and we'll have a little powwow before I crash. I have something to tell you, anyway." She stops. "Unless disappearing with you gets me taken less seriously by command." She's so used to hanging out with Finnick in the Capitol that she's forgotten where she is.

Finnick throws his head back and laughs. "If Elspa starts throwing stones, let me know. I'll give her a hard time and enjoy it."

"Seriously?"

"What, you thought it was just a reputation?" Finnick's offended. "Welcome to Four. You're the only one who hasn't slept with me."

"Which is why no one will believe me." Johanna sighs. "Fine. Let's go have our 'quickie'."

"Actually, if anything's going to make you stand out, it's going to be the way I'm still disappearing with you after all these years. No one lasts that long."

"That's because you never met me before." Even tired and stressed, she can do saucy.

Finnick laughs, loud enough to draw some curious looks. "I really haven't, you know."

As long as it looks like he's chasing her, she can live with it.

But when they're settled, before she can get started with her confession, the first thing he says is, "I think you know this, but with my reputation, I want to make sure I say it: I'm not chasing you. I'm not hitting on you. No matter what I say, or do, or if I want to get you alone, I'm not making a pass. If you ever decide you're interested in sex, with men, with me, I trust you won't be shy about letting me know." She snickers. "Until then, we're just getting work done."

"I believe you." Johanna leans back against the wall, trying to surreptitiously position herself so that she's not pressing on the worst of her old Scorpio injuries. "I'm not interested."

"I believe you." Finnick slumps to the ground beside her, his guard down. "What's on your mind?"

Johanna looks at him with some of her resentment melting. How hard must it be for him to find someone he can say that to? If she's had it bad, he's had it worse. Maybe that's _why_ she believes him.

Now if only she can find a way of telling him what she's done without losing all his respect.

She opens slowly. "Pearleye tells me you want to use District Seven to pass food and supplies through?"

"Do you think it's doable?" Finnick looks concerned.

"I'm doing everything in my power to make it happen," she promises. "That's why I'm here, in Four. But when I was in the Capitol, when I was trying to talk my way out, I told them you were after lumber."

Finnick thinks about it. "They'll probably catch on eventually, but it may buy us some time before they realize how important those supply lines are."

"No, I-I mean I told them you wanted lumber from us when that's what I thought you wanted. I told them the truth."

"Well, you had to, didn't you? If everything you said was a lie, they'd have caught on, and they'd never let you go."

"But I could have just not told them anything!" she bursts. Does he not _understand_ what she did?

"Then they wouldn't have let you go." Finnick shrugs. "I did propaganda for ten years for the Capitol. You think that didn't hurt us, help them? But if I hadn't, I wouldn't have been able to spy. You do what you have to, if you want to fight back."

"I could have been braver. I thought I wouldn't talk, but then-" Her voice trails off.

"But then you were alone in the hands of the enemy and you realized you wanted to win? You pick your battles when you're outmatched, Mags always said that. If you can't outfight them, you outsmart them."

This is why she picked Finnick to fess up to. It's still too good to be true. "You're not mad at me?"

Finnick chokes in disbelief. "You're not mad at _me_? At us? I didn't have your back in the arena, and then we traded for Peeta. I already told you, no one gets to criticize anything you did to get out. I don't care if you had sex with the whole Capitol." He winks flamboyantly. "I don't care if you made them think you liked it. I don't care if you did."

Johanna snorts. Trust Finnick to make her think she might be able to laugh again someday. "I didn't."

"Well, that makes one of us. But I mean it. Whatever you did, whatever it is you're remembering and wishing you hadn't done, you survived."

She folds her arms on her chest. "Like what?"

"Doesn't matter. Normally we tell victors it's all right if they killed someone, got someone killed, left someone to die, said something cruel...but knowing you, I think you need to hear that no one thinks you're weak. If you cried, if you threw up, if you begged, if you lost control of your body, if you feel like they broke you...it doesn't matter."

Johanna looks at him warily. What does he know, or guess, about her captivity? Does he know how much of her infamous act in the Seventy-First Hunger Games was real and how much was an act?

"It doesn't matter any more than anything you did in the arena," Finnick says emphatically.

"Which you're not holding against me," she checks yet again.

Finnick gives her an approving look. "We're proud of you. You're one of us. Better a live ally than a dead martyr."

"Is that what Mags said too?" Johanna mutters, and then she wants to bite her tongue. There she goes again, saying whatever pops into her head. Most of the time she doesn't care, but flaunting Mags' death at Finnick...

Finnick keeps from showing any emotion. "Mags said we needed allies outside Four more than we needed more help in Four. Katniss. Peeta. You."

"I'll try to make it worth it."

"You're worth it. You always were. I'm sorry about how we had to play it in the arena. I've got your back now."

She has no idea what to say to that. _Thank you_ is so pale and inadequate when she's hearing these words and believing them for the first time in her life. _I've got yours_ feels like a lie when she's fresh out of telling her captors about Four's plans for the war.

"Tell me what you need from me," she finally settles on. "I'll do anything it takes."

Finnick smiles. "Be yourself. We'll work out the details together."


	3. Chapter 3

Peeta gasps in shock when he sees Finnick, and Finnick has to suppress the impulse to do the same. Instead, he gives the bruised, shivering boy his most reassuring, non-threatening smile.

"You're alive," Peeta says hoarsely. He half sits up on his hospital cot and stares at Finnick as if he can't be sure he's not a phantom of his imagination.

"And so are you," Finnick assures him. He's moving slowly, making no sudden movements. "Mind if I sit down?" He eases himself down on the edge of the bed, facing Peeta, when he makes no objection. He wouldn't blame Peeta for holding the same grudge Katniss does.

"And Katniss?" Peeta pleads. "Is it really true she's alive?"

"Alive and well. I've seen her myself."

"They said she was dead!" Peeta's voice grows more agitated. "That everyone but me had died in the arena. And then they sent me here, and now everyone keeps saying she's alive, but they won't show me any evidence or let me leave...Is this really District Four?"

"Yes, except it's not a district any more," Finnick says. "You're safe here. We kicked out all the Peacekeepers, and we're fighting a war to overthrow the government." If Peeta doesn't even know this much, then Finnick shouldn't have let them keep him from visiting this long, Pearleye or no Pearleye.

"I don't know what to believe," Peeta says desperately. "They lied to me in the Capitol, you lied to me in the arena..."

"We tried telling Katniss. It would have been impossible to keep you alive if we said too much in the Capitol. But you're here now, you're safe. I'll answer any question I can, and if there's one I can't answer, I'll tell you, I won't lie to you."

"Is it true about Twelve?" When Finnick nods, Peeta presses relentlessly, "You saw it? With your own eyes? Because they can fake these things on television-"

"I saw it," Finnick says quietly. "I talked to the survivors. I'm sorry."

He gives as much detail as he thinks Peeta can manage in his current condition, emphasizing the evacuation.

"When do I get to leave? They won't let me out of the room."

It's not clear to Finnick that Peeta would be capable of leaving this bed on his own at the moment.

"As soon as you're ready. There's a diplomatic convoy from Four to Thirteen leaving soon. I'll be part of it, though I'll just be passing through Thirteen on my way to—well, another country." Finnick grins sharply. "It gets me on the other side of the world from Pearleye, which is how she likes it. Anyway, we'll take you, if you're ready.

"If you're not, I've told the mayor I'm happy to give you an escort myself when I come back."

"Don't you get tired of escorting me?" Peeta sounds less bitter than afraid. Or maybe that's just his voice shaking along with the rest of his body. "And no, I want to go home. Or-"

He doesn't have a home.

"Don't you get tired of being brave?" Finnick asks gently. "We'll take you back to your people. I'm sorry I didn't try to find out what happened to your family when I was in Thirteen. I never expected I'd see you before you knew. But we'll get you back as soon as we can."

Peeta nods, and he blinks hard a couple of times and widens his eyes. Finnick can see him fighting back tears, so he rises. "Hang in there."

* * *

Finnick needn't, it turns out, have worried about Peeta avoiding him. On the journey to Thirteen, Finnick makes a point of checking in with everyone on the team at least once a day, and Peeta, who doesn't know anyone else here, starts almost clinging to him.

He's not talkative, exactly, wrapped up in his memories and private grief, but once Finnick's reached out a couple of times, he finds Peeta consistently sleeping in the bedroll next to his, eating not far away, and keeping him in sight when they walk.

Finnick doesn't have either the foggiest clue what to say to someone who's been through what Peeta has, nor does he know him well enough to be able to offer him the support of a friend, but if the unobtrusive presence of a familiar face is any comfort, then Peeta will have what Finnick can give him.

One night Peeta is cleaning his prosthetic as Finnick is taking first watch, and as always, Peeta's got his head tilted, keeping track of Finnick's movements in case he goes too far. Obscurely comforted himself, Finnick chooses a spot close enough to Peeta to talk quietly.

"How're you holding up?"

Peeta shrugs, turning over the limb in his hands. "It is what it is. I'll make it." Then he smiles a little. "You never say it, but you always seem to know when I need a rest. And not only me."

"Ssh," Finnick whispers conspiratorially, "don't say that where the others can hear you. They're former Careers, they have their pride." He has to admit, being in charge of a mission has completely changed his attitude toward being far and away the most athletic person around. From being competitive, Finnick's now stopped showing off and started feeling responsible for getting everyone through a war zone in one piece.

 _So this is what you were talking about all those years, Mags._ It's a new feeling.

"Really?" Peeta looks up in his surprise. "I thought this was a diplomatic mission."

Finnick chokes. "What, you think we have diplomacy school back in Four? These are Careers, they came out of the academy, they're loyal, they're reasonably good at talking to people. That's the best we've got." Chuckling, he remembers years of Rudder rescuing Lucretius from his student's antics by pulling Finnick out of the class and into a real challenge until he shut up, which only Mags understood was all Finnick ever wanted in the first place. Still, Finnick doesn't envy any of his former trainers. Lucretius doesn't seem to be holding a grudge, at least.

"I guess we're all doing things we're not cut out for." Peeta looks down despondently. "I don't know what use I'll be. Just the burden everyone else has to protect."

"Look, you're worth protecting. You're one of the reasons we're fighting this war. But if you want a hint, I think Katniss could use a friend when we get to Thirteen."

"You should hate me."

"You should hate me!" But Finnick laughs. They obviously don't hate each other. "I didn't do a very good job protecting you."

"I didn't make it easy on you."

"You were busy doing your own protecting. And you didn't know. Nothing that happened was your fault, okay?"

Peeta nods, with about the same conviction that Finnick would have if someone said that to him.

So he's not surprised, when, after their first skirmish, he goes to check on Peeta first thing, and finds the guilt eating at him again. Finnick volunteered for first watch, because he wants to keep an eye on how everyone else is reacting, even though he himself is feeling drained and exhilarated after the adrenaline and might actually sleep fine tonight. He has responsibilities.

Peeta looks predicably devastated, but the first words out of his mouth are not what Finnick expected.

"You should give me a gun, something. Let me fight, defend myself, instead of just sitting here like a dead weight all the time."

"You're brave," Finnick says kindly. "But you're a civilian." He doesn't say anything about whether a gun would make Peeta less of a liability or more of one, because he can see Peeta doesn't really want to fight. If this were Gale, or Katniss, Finnick would start them training with firearms. If it were Johanna, she'd already have one. But this is just Peeta's guilt talking. "You don't have to be a combat soldier to be worth protecting. Annie isn't."

"Then how am I ever supposed to pay you back?"

Finnick settles in more comfortably next to Peeta, with his arms around his knees. "Listen. I'll tell you what a very wise woman once told me. You don't pay debts back. You pay them forward. Mags adopted me at nine, gave me a place to stay, and trained me up for the Games. You think I ever paid that back?" He knows Mags would say the exact same words if she were here, but they're a thin shield against his own self-loathing that she's not. He should have been able to save them _both_.

But he didn't, and Mags doesn't need him now, Peeta does. So he keeps talking. "You give what you have to give where it's needed. You needed me, and while I was rescuing you, someone else was rescuing Annie. Now I don't need you, but Katniss does. Promise me."

Peeta takes him by the hand. "I promise."

"Besides, I just realized, you did save me once." When Peeta looks at him in confusion, Finnick starts laughing, because life is so weird sometimes.

He gives Peeta a summary of how he spent the months between the Seventy-Fifth Hunger Games and the Victory Ball, trying not to dread the day he got the news that he was now officially a Capitolite. "I have you and Katniss to thank that Snow was so busy worrying about unrest in the districts and executing Gamemakers that I didn't even seem like a problem in comparison. And for that matter, I did try to return the favor, tried to keep you from looking like a threat."

 _"You seem very...taken...with Miss Everdeen." Snow folded his hands on his desk, inviting Finnick to explain._

 _"Oh, you know me." Finnick gave a self-deprecating toss of his head. "I'm always happy to talk about whatever my clients are obsessed with. And the Girl on Fire's romance is this year's flash in the pan. Last year it was the big scandal over corrupt horse races, remember? Next year it'll be poodle-dyeing, or those shoes that curl up a foot in front of you."_

 _"I hope so. You see no serious interest from your...patrons, then?"_

 _"I don't think she's got what it takes to hold their interest year after year. Not like me. I couldn't see her talking about poodles and sounding interested." He grinned insouciantly. "I'm easy."_

"It wasn't enough," he tells Peeta. "But I did my best. I don't know if you want to tell Katniss this, but even before that, I put in a good word with my sponsors to help get you that rule change, while Haymitch was doing the same with the Gamemakers. It still wouldn't have done the trick without you and Katniss and your berries."

"There wouldn't have been any berries, though, without you and Haymitch," Peeta says.

Finnick inclines his head.

"Saving my life since before we even met." Peeta nudges him with a small smile. "Don't let me get you...don't die saving me before we get to Thirteen, though, okay?"

Finnick avoids making an outright promise not to die, and instead says the most encouraging thing he can think of. "We're both going to make it to Thirteen, and then you can put in a good word for me with Katniss."

Peeta looks startled. "Why one earth would she need one?"

"Well, I didn't save you enough, you see."

Peeta purses his lips, shakes his head, and puts his hand on Finnick's. "I'll talk to her. Don't worry."

* * *

Encouraging words notwithstanding, Finnick privately calls it a miracle when the whole team, Peeta included, arrives in District Thirteen. He takes them straight to one of the compounds he was familiar with, and Lucretius is in charge from there.

Lucretius introduces himself, explains why he's here with a convoy from Four, and gains them entrance. They're filing in, Finnick with his eyes on the ground, avoiding eye contact, holding his breath, when-

"Finnick Odair."

Finnick freezes, the smile stiff on his face. Why, _why_ is he delaying getting his face reworked? Telling himself that anyone who could do it is now on the enemy side is just an excuse. All these years of telling himself the vanity was just an act, and now he finds himself strangely attached to it.

"Yes?" He tries laying on the charm, not that it's ever worked here.

"You're not authorized to be here." An armed guard steps up to his face, followed by another.

He's grateful to his compatriots for stopping, as a group, in front of and around him.

"What?" Lucretius is outraged. Finnick wonders if Pearleye passed on the details of Finnick's last exploit here.

"He saved my life!" Peeta protests. "Where's Katniss?"

"She's not here. Neither is General Heavensbee, although he's expected back tomorrow."

"I'm here to talk to him," Finnick says.

"I'm not allowed to let you into the compound," the guard insists. "If you're not going to leave, you'll need to come with us."

Everyone from Four stiffens, and hands start to drift toward weapons.

"No, no." Finnick holds out a hand to stop them. "I don't want to cause a diplomatic incident. I'll go quietly, if you'll work this out?" Finnick exchanges a look with Lucretius. He doesn't know the man well, but there's no way Four is going to let its most prominent citizen languish in custody.

Lucretius is annoyed, whether by Plutarch or Finnick or both, Finnick can't tell. "I'll take care of it."

Peeta surprises everyone by stepping forward and taking Finnick's wrist in his hand. "I'm staying with him." When the guard tries to stop him, Peeta doesn't budge. "Do you have orders that I can't?"

The guard hesitates. "Noo." Then she straightens. "Come along, then."

Finnick walks with the barrel of a gun pressed to his back and his head held high. Peeta hangs on stubbornly, and Finnick lets him. He's still feeling protective of the boy, and if Katniss isn't here, Finnick wants to keep an eye on him until she is. And it won't hurt to have Peeta in the room when Finnick first confronts Plutarch. He needs something concrete he can point to as a token of success.

They desperately need an alliance between Four and Thirteen. Ayre is less urgent, but he's going to give it his best shot. He does have contacts there, and he knows he did fine during the meet-and-greet.

Finnick and Peeta are escorted to a room that's small, but no more austere than the one Finnick shared with Cashmere when he was a free agent here. The difference is the guards posted on the outside.

Peeta settles in beside him once the door is closed. "Anything they do to you," he promises, "they'll have to do to me, and there'll be a witness."

Finnick gives him a grateful smile. He hopes it won't be necessary, but it's such a relief to have someone on his side. "You're loyal."

"Wait, where's Haymitch?" Peeta leaps to his feet. "He could help."

Finnick stops him before he can get to the door. "Thank you, but I don't think I'm in his good graces either." He can only imagine the betrayal Haymitch must feel, and he wouldn't blame him for being downright smug at Finnick's current predicament.

"What?" Peeta spins around, frowning. "Katniss, Plutarch, now Haymitch? What did you do? Were you not supposed to rescue me?"

"No, I was. Who I wasn't supposed to rescue was Cashmere. That's why Plutarch didn't trust me from the beginning. I think Katniss also didn't like it, or at least my relationship with her afterward. Haymitch had no problem with that part, but later I took advantage of him when he was impaired by alcohol.

"Not like that," Finnick adds quickly, to the look on Peeta's face. "Politically. Look, you might as well know this about me: I'm ruthless."

"You're ruthless because you saved my life? And Cashmere's?"

"I'm ruthless because I let the most important person in my life die so I could save your life, so we could get on Katniss's good side, so she'd risk her life helping us win a war. I'm ruthless because there wasn't one person I slept with in the Capitol that I wasn't using. You don't win the Hunger Games at fourteen by being nice, Peeta.

"I wish you'd never been put in an arena, I wish you were home in your bakery right now, sharing a cake with the ones you love. But since I can't make that happen, I have to work with what I have. Which is a war. So be warned."

Peeta looks stubborn. "If I'd stayed with you by the tree, if I'd trusted you, you'd have protected me, right? And Johanna Katniss?"

"Johanna did save Katniss's life. And I would have protected you the best I could. I'm sorry it wasn't more."

"Well, you protected me a lot. The least I can do is stand by you."

A little hope flickers in Finnick. Maybe Peeta will be able to get through to Katniss. Maybe she'll start speaking to him after all.

* * *

Between Katniss, Plutarch, and Haymitch, Finnick is so resigned to having everyone in Thirteen resent him that it takes him by surprise when Coral actually seeks him out. She's got a tight look on her face like she doesn't want to be here, and he doesn't blame her, but he gives her an apologetic smile anyway. Peeta's asleep in the corner.

"What can I do for you?" Finnick says in a low voice.

Coral starts signing, slowly. He can tell it's as painful for her to sign slowly as it is for him to demonstrate weapons play in slow motion. He almost suggests for her sake that she try writing it, but if she'd wanted to do that, she would have done it that way in the first place. So he just prepares to focus to the point of a throbbing head and figures it's the least he can do.

 _What's going on at home?_

Finnick wishes he could respond in kind, practice his skills by struggling and having her help him along, but it's not her job to be his teacher. So he simply gives her the update aloud.

 _Is it safe to travel back?_ she asks when he's finished.

He smiles. "I have no doubt that anyone who made it out of a burning building and escaped the Capitol and made it—how many hundreds of miles?—to District Thirteen during the riots has as good a shot as anyone else at making it back. You might get killed or captured, but so might I. If you're saying you'd rather not make the trip alone, that makes two of us. Everyone who came here with me is staying, and I'd love to have someone to trade watches with on the way back. But if you'd rather knife me in my sleep, I won't blame you. I'll give you a map with new borders and as much information as I can."

 _I'm not in love with you. But I didn't travel alone last time either._

"I won't touch you, I promise. I've never touched anyone," he says apologetically, "it's always the other way around.

"The only problem if you want to travel with me is that I'm on my way east, to Ayre. I won't be back for weeks, maybe months."

 _I can wait._ Coral gives him an ironic look. _I won't knife you in your sleep_.

He believes her.

 _You were working for Mags?_

Summoning up his most sincere expression, Finnick answers this question with no indication that it's the hundredth time he's answered it since he came out. "Since I was fourteen. I'm sorry I couldn't tell you. Mags would have killed me. I had to stick to my cover story of being a complete airhead."

Coral stands staring at him for a good long time. Then her fingers flicker. _So was I._

Finnick stares at her hands. "No. I misunderstood that."

Impatient and just a little smug, Coral spells it out. _I-W-A-S-S-P-Y-I-N-G-F-O-R-M-A-G-S._

"No. You volunteered?!" _Me being a spy is one thing!_ No one thought he was smart enough or had any motivation, but at least signing up for a playboy lifestyle isn't that implausible. Signing up to have your tongue cut out?

She rolls her eyes. _Are you stupid? I was already in trouble with the law. On the run. Nowhere to go._ Coral's going as slowly through this part as she can, repeating and simplifying when she has to. _Someone told Mags, arranged a meeting. She said if I turned myself in, I could have enough to eat in the Capitol and collect information for her. She could use it to help make life better in District Four. Or I could stay in hiding and risk being executed._

 _I chose to spy._

"Holy shit. She never told me!"

 _Maybe she didn't trust you._

"She trusted me!" But he knew there was a whole world of information that Mags had that she didn't share with him because he didn't need to know. He was happy to leave a lot of the logistical details to her and Pearleye and Benton. But another spy in the Capitol? How many spies did the woman have?

Coral relents. _She didn't tell me about you either. I thought it was just her and me helping each other out, saving my life so I could help her bend the rules._

"So did I, for the longest time. It was years before I found out about the secession plans and the conspiracy. How did you pass information back to her? That was my biggest unsolved problem when I was worried about ending up a permanent lapdog in the Capitol."

 _Avox conspiracy. Not everyone but a lot. Most in H-E-A-V-E-N-S-B-E-E's circle. D-I-S-A-F-F-E-C-T-I-O-N. Hunger Games training center. M-A-G-S understood signing._

"Mags understood—Fucking hell." So that whole time Mags was sitting there with him in Seventy-Four...she could understand everything the Avox woman was saying. She just couldn't let on because...because she couldn't communicate in any language. Because the goal was for him to learn it, not her.

But couldn't Mags have taught him at home years before?

She must not have thought it was important for him to know. And to be fair, he was twenty-two before he even caught a glimpse of this sign language, and it was his idea to pick it up.

"Wow. You have officially rocked my world."

 _I was the one who got Mags word of District 13._

"Do you have information from the last year you want to pass onto Pearleye?"

Coral nods.

"All right. I'll accompany you back as soon as I can."

He leaves out the part where first Plutarch has to let him go. He doesn't think the general will dare to have Finnick executed, not in the face of his popularity and the now demonstrated armed might of Four, but he does wonder if he did something stupid by coming back.

He gets just enough time to start worrying about being trapped here, where he can't be a public inconvenience, for the rest of his life, when General Heavensbee summons Finnick to demand an explanation in person.

Peeta keeps his hand around Finnick's wrist, from the moment they step out of their detainment room throughout the escort down the long corridors, daring anyone to separate them.

Finnick does not smile, he _does not_ smile, though it takes all his willpower, at the sight that greets him and Peeta.

No cozy personal office for this conversation, no. The auditorium where Plutarch makes his public speeches. Enough witnesses and guards that they could do a lot more than separate him and Peeta.

No matter, Finnick has his own witness.

He doesn't look around for assistance as he walks into the room, but he does nod to everyone he recognizes and greet them by name.

"Time for pleasantries later," Heavensbee finally interrupts him. Finnick knows a lot of people, and as power plays go, this one is fairly obvious. "What are you doing here?"

"Where's Katniss?" Peeta demands. Finnick had suggested that he go first. He presented it as an act of generosity—personal ties before political machinations—but he means for it to get the crowd's sympathies on their side.

Heavensbee is thrown off his stride, as Finnick intended. With feelings about Katniss running high, and Peeta a recently freed POW, he can't refuse to answer.

Finnick puts his hand on Peeta's shoulder. Together, they emanate solidarity.

Yes, everything he does is calculated. That doesn't mean Peeta can't benefit.

Finnick can see Plutarch already regretting letting them stick together. Like everyone else, he underestimated Peeta. Finnick didn't—he got to know a certain Annie Cresta, once upon a time.

"The Mockingjay is in District Ten," Plutarch informs him, "with Abernathy. I'll get word to her as soon as I can. Lucretius Sterling has informed me that Four negotiated for your release?"

Peeta nods.

Plutarch looks extremely displeased, and Finnick starts to wonder what the hell is wrong with rescuing Peeta all of a sudden. "The Capitol played us. They released Johanna Mason in Seven in her home district, and broadcast the release. An 'act of generosity', they called it. So we believed them when they did the same with Peeta Mellark, in the ruins of District Twelve.

"We knew it was a trap, of course. And we didn't let the Mockingjay go."

Finnick wonders if they had to sedate her again and sneak out the rescue team while she was unconscious, to keep her from joining it. He doesn't imagine just tying her down would work.

"But we had to send a rescue mission, we couldn't not."

"Who was leading the team?" Finnick interrupts. "Gale Hawthorne?" It's a guess, but an educated one.

Plutarch gives him a bleak look. "You knew him. We didn't find all the bodies. His was one we did find."

Finnick's hand tightens on Peeta's shoulder in the same moment that Peeta flinches. "It's not your fault," he breathes. "I should have been here," he says, more loudly.

"You always think you're the best person for every job." Plutarch's voice is acid.

"No, only some of them. And it's hard to lose someone who's been on your team and not feel you should have been there."

"You're certainly here now. I don't seem able to get rid of you. Though I'm told you're just passing through, so I must confess I'm not sure why you bothered to stop at all." Plutarch raises an eyebrow.

"Well, you know, there are some land mines out there, and I've steered teams through them safely before. I had to make good on my promise and deliver Peeta in one piece. I'm sorry it took so long, I was hoping to do this straight out of the arena." The condescension bordering on sarcasm is flowing from both sides. "I have a couple of requests, while I'm here. One, I want a list of survivors from District Twelve."

"Why?" Plutarch's immediately suspicious.

"So Peeta can see who he knows who's on the list. I know you've split them up among the compounds in Thirteen, and I don't think he should have to go from compound to compound looking for a familiar face."

Finnick sees Plutarch try for a couple of seconds, but he can't think of a way to refuse that one without being ungracious. Good, Finnick was using that to soften him up. "What else?"

Finnick lays down his ultimatum. "You can either share your access to your contacts in Ayre, or I can figure out how to get there on my own. It'll take longer, but I think you know I can do it."

"Why should I want you in Ayre? They're not going to give us aid."

"Military or humanitarian?"

Plutarch doesn't answer.

"Right, you only asked for military. We're going to try a different approach. I'll put in a good word for you. What've you got to lose?"

"We can try again later, after we've had a few victories, if you don't go ruin it for us."

Finnick chokes on his laughter. "Oh, you think they said no because of me? Is that the reason they gave you?"

"I'll tell you what reason they gave me. Let me give you all a little history lesson. I know there aren't many books outside the Capitol."

Wow, this is getting petty. Finnick almost says something, but he wants the history lesson. The more information, the better.

"After the great war, hundreds of years ago, a world that was, if not united, at least in constant contact, became splintered, fragmented. Isolated populations here and there around the globe had to rebuild, rediscover lost technology. Panem went the way of stockpiling weapons, building a military, suppressing the masses, building as much technology for luxury and weapons as they could, making the districts do manual labor that could be automated. For their price of not bombing the rest of the world, they've demanded to be left alone.

"And they've gotten it. No one else has a military that can match Panem's, no one else wants to risk another nuclear war. Some countries are building empires, but many are remaining isolated. Ayre is one that has achieved a good standard of living through recovering old technology, automating unskilled labor, and providing food so cheaply there is almost no scarcity, but they have deliberately chosen isolationism. They have banned many technologies for weapons and communications. They have clumsy telephones, but no televisions. Computers for industry but not for personal use. They have just enough of a military to protect their borders against small-scale invasions, but they're counting on Panem to ignore them, an ocean away.

"They don't believe world peace can be achieved, but they point to the distant past, when lack of globalization limited the blast radius of a war. Countries squabbled with their neighbors over territories, men and women died, but a thousand miles away, no one knew. Great suffering came when one country had the power to bring down the human race.

"They are sympathetic to our cause, and I have reason to believe, hoping that we win. But they will take no action to provoke the Capitol into launching nukes. Only if we can convince them that together we can crush the Capitol before it has a chance to do anything that impacts the other side of the world will Ayre make a move."

While Finnick is taking this in, he hears Lucretius' voice. "But they knew we were starting a war, and they were still willing to send a delegation to meet with you. We think they're open to negotiation. If they have so much food, and they're sympathetic to our starving children, we can ask them to share. Finnick is equipped with portable tapes with Hunger Games excerpts to show them."

"And you all think he's the best person to send." Plutarch folds his arms across his chest.

"To get sponsor gifts?" Finnick flashes a smile. "Absolutely. Besides, they don't know I'm a useless playboy, remember. Clean slate."

"We, of Four," Lucretius adds more seriously, "would welcome your assistance. We would consider it an auspicious start to our alliance."

Plutarch shoots Finnick a dark look, annoyed that he's being manipulated into supporting Finnick.

And from there it's just haggling over the details.

* * *

After months out of the country, Finnick's so desperate for news of Annie that he stops in Three before he goes to Pearleye. When Coral's impatient at the delay, he concocts something about needing to make sure Rudder has the news, but really Finnick knows Pearleye would want him to come straight back.

He won't stay, Finnick promises himself, he won't even lay eyes on Annie's face. He just needs to know she's all right.

But he won't ask immediately, either, because he's afraid of how that looks. That's why he doesn't say anything when the first thing Rudder wants is to put him on the front lines, reminding Finnick that he hasn't made any appearances lately, the troops in Three barely know him, the usual. Finnick can't decide whether it's a flimsy excuse to let him spend time in Three or such an obvious duty that it barely needs spelling out, but he accepts with gratitude.

Fighting off the constant barrage of bombs, laughing with the adrenaline, shaking at near misses and then laughing those off too, walking among the wounded and thanking them for their sacrifice...it's hard not not to feel a twinge of guilt at being out of the action for so long. Military and civilians alike died while he was safe in countries where war and oppression are ancient history.

From inwardly gloating about his diplomatic victories, Finnick starts to wonder how they're going to win at all. With the factories exposed like this, without the ability to do anything about it because they have nowhere else for the large-scale manufacturing, with more holes in the borders than in a fishing net...how has the Capitol not won yet?

"You ever miss fighting with tridents?" Finnick teases Rudder, using gallows humor to sound out how worried Rudder is.

As always, Rudder's hard to read. "Did I?" Rudder asks, innocently. "I only remember spears."

"You know what I mean." Finnick waves his hand impatiently, laughing in spite of himself. Seventy-Five, the one and only time there was a trident in the Cornucopia. He's still proud of that one. _Man, I need to remind Brine of that next time I see him._ Then he sobers, remembering his failures. "I tried to get you better weapons," he confesses.

Quickly, Finnick gives an account of where he's been, and the humanitarian aid he managed to coax out of Ayre and one of its neighbors, Kedan. He'd boasted to Plutarch, but now blankets and even food don't sound like much. "I did the best I could. Maybe someone else could have done better."

"I don't know why they didn't send me to do the talking," Rudder deadpans.

Finnick snorts, comforted a little. "You'd be surprised. Plutarch once thought Haymitch would be better for a diplomatic job than me."

"He didn't know what you'd really been up to in the Capitol, did he?" Rudder gives Finnick a look sympathetic enough to remind him that he was always Rudder's favorite student.

A shrug. "He's been told. I don't think he really knows, no."

"Well, food and medicine are going to go a long way here. There's a reason I wanted you visible the moment I got you. Four's not so popular here these days."

Finnick tenses. "Why not?" They need this alliance.

"Hunger Games. We didn't get reaped, Three got reaped twice to make up for it."

Finnick swears. "All right, when the overseas aid starts coming in, I'll get as much diverted to you as possible. Plutarch's going to get the bulk of it, but..." His jaw firms. "I'll do what I can, and I'll work with Pearleye. Meanwhile, I need to watch the Hunger Games, see what they've been doing. We need to counter their propaganda. I take it you have tapes."

Maybe by the time he's made the journey down to Four, he'll have some proposals for Pearleye.

* * *

Finnick's been resolutely trying not to notice where Rudder is taking them, but when they stop outside the bunker he recognizes, and Rudder starts the biometric screening process, Finnick can't help himself.

"You would tell me if-"

Rudder gives him a stern look. "I carried her out of her second floor window and out of the Village under fire, and you think I wouldn't tell you? She's fine."

Finnick nods, shuts that line of thinking down, and tries to conceal his embarrassment at his weakness. Rudder's going to think he can't be trusted.

The door slides open to admit them. "Just let me stop in and see if Beetee has any news I should be on top of."

While Rudder heads toward Beetee's room, Finnick goes to sit in the lab. Most people are working, but he manages to get Silica into a chat. Annie's just down the hall, but he can't go looking her up, not with Rudder coming out any minute. After, he promises himself.

"What're you working on?" Finnick nods toward the handful of identical devices on the table.

"Portable flight simulators." Silica looks aggrieved. "The last batch had a couple of bugs, which I've been chasing down. I think I caught them, but who knows how many I introduced. Now I've got to go through the tedious part of running through all the tests again." He laughs. "Look at me procrastinating talking to you."

Finnick can almost feel his mouth water. "A portable...flight...simulator?" he repeats, his hand reaching out toward the middle of the table.

"Yeah, they project holograms into the air around you. Interesting challenges for programming, horrendously tedious to come up with thorough tests for. Not as critical as the actual hovercraft software, of course; if the simulator crashes, someone gets annoyed, no one dies. But I'd rather be writing code than tests."

"I want one!" There aren't enough hovercraft to let just anyone practice in a real one, and Finnick doesn't have the time to dedicate himself to the full-time pilot training he'd need to get priority. "Can I help you test?"

"Well, the tests are automated, but the last bug slipped past the test suite and was caught by an actual pilot, so...I wouldn't say no if you want to have a go at it." He glances at the closed door behind which Rudder and Beetee are chatting. "If you don't have the clearance now, I imagine you can get it in the next few minutes, so let's skip the formalities."

Finnick's eagerly, passionately absorbed in trying out a takeoff for the first time, when Beetee wheels out into the lab, Rudder just behind him.

Rudder signals to Finnick to join him. "Good, you're keeping busy. Come on, we can use his room for this."

With a wrench as he comes out of the zone, Finnick looks up and remembers why he's here. Not so that he can finally fully master a new skill, but so that he can watch children die, offer advice on propaganda, and basically fill any role Rudder needs. It doesn't matter how he wants to spend his time; what matters is how he can be useful. He covers his disorientation by glancing at the clock.

"Either you're really bad at negotiating private rooms," Finnick teases, "or you and Beetee have a lot to talk about. You were in there half an hour."

Rudder shrugs. "He gets the military updates, I get the technological updates."

Inside Beetee's personal work and living space, they close the door. Finnick realizes, belatedly, that probably no one in the bunker wants to rewatch the Seventy-Sixth Hunger Games.

He watches the crown go to the girl from District One, the only district other than Two to remain loyal to the Capitol. "Enobaria last year," Finnick observes, and Rudder nods.

"How well did you know Cashmere?"

"Enough to know she didn't want to be there. On her own, I think she would have buckled down and tried her best. Once her brother was reaped...it was like Katniss. I kept turning my back on Katniss because even though I knew she could bring herself to kill me, I had the feeling she'd have to work herself up to it first, and she'd take any excuse not to. I had the same feeling about Cashmere, that she wouldn't kill me if I didn't give her a reason. Now, I know she wanted Katniss dead, and there was that risk, but we were so close to the endgame, I thought I could keep an eye on her and keep de-escalating until it was all over."

"I see. Well, we need to go over Seventy-Five as well." Rudder holds up a second rectangular piece of plastic between his thumb and forefinger, daring him to refuse.

Finnick wants to refuse so badly that he nods as quicky as he can. The point of a mentor is to hold the bar higher than you'd try to clear on your own.

Then, as the familiar music starts to play, it occurs to Finnick that he doesn't have a mentor left except for the man sitting next to him. Rudder must have known about all the hours Mags spent going over all the tapes with him, must know Mags would want him here scrutinizing his performance and learning everything he can.

Finnick glances at Rudder curiously. Is he trying to fill Mags' shoes?

But that's not the sort of question he can ask, so he simply turns to the screen and tightens his mask. Mags is going to die again, and he will not— _cannot_ —break down until he's safe in Annie's room.

"Your gamble with Cashmere paid off, and you may be right about Katniss," Rudder concedes. "But here's your first big mistake." He fast forwards to the end of the first day. "Letting her keep watch. Even if you trusted her, she doesn't have the training you take for granted."

On screen, Finnick sees Katniss's eyes close, and stay closed.

"Fuck." Finnick clenches a fist around the edge of the table leg to still his trembling fingers. _I killed Mags. I killed Mags._

The words echo silently and relentlessly, while Rudder waits, without saying anything. At last, Mags makes an appearance in Finnick's mind, folding her arms and looking expectantly at him.

What would she want him to do?

 _Learn from the past and focus on the future._

What else could he have done? Still clinging to the solid wood of the table, Finnick goes over the possibilities with Rudder.

In the hypothetical scenario after he overrode Katniss and took first watch, his options were limited. He did need to sleep at some point. It's not clear whether he could have counted on Mags to wake him if she felt herself dozing off, not after the stroke. Maybe Mags and Katniss together, watching each other.

Planning it all out steadies him little by little. He can see how Mags found her way into strategy as a form of survival.

Finnick remembers her dead family. She wouldn't hold it against him. But after ten years without a single misstep, to get Mags killed and then the very next day, go running after some birds shouting his name...He'd gotten used to thinking he was good at this.

Peeta under supervision in Four, lost and too thin and shaking. Johanna beating herself up over getting herself out of captivity.

"I'll mention Katniss to Haymitch," is all Finnick says, in the end. "Suggest he makes sure she gets some training like you gave us, if she hasn't already. She has a lot of potential. And you're right, I took my training for granted because I saw all that potential."

After that, watching the fog creep on them, watching the mad race, is easier and harder than he expected. He's already killed Mags, the rest is just details.

Still, Finnick watches himself on the screen and wills the straining figure to run faster, wondering what the hell was wrong with him.

He was holding back from the beginning, he remembers. Unable to leave Katniss and Peeta behind even if he could have run clear in time to get him and Mags out. Unwilling to leave Katniss and Mags, when it was him and Peeta. And then the nerve gas, insidious, crippling.

Finnick trades commentary with Rudder without much thought, while he watches. Every second is eternity, as he watches the boy on screen run, and run.

Then he wonders. Did they run for a long time, or did it just feel that way?

Now Finnick is fighting to keep his hand clutching the table instead of snatching the remote control from Rudder. It doesn't matter. Letting Katniss keep first watch was a fatal mistake. Whether or not it actually killed Mags doesn't make a difference to how important it is not to make that mistake again.

Involuntarily, his left hand opens, and Rudder passes him the remote. Hating himself for this weakness, Finnick rewinds. He has to know.

"It doesn't matter," he forces himself to say, when he realizes that even if Katniss hadn't drifted off momentarily, he still couldn't have gotten everyone out alive in the time they had. "I won't make that mistake again."

It's a mistake to feel so relieved that he didn't kill Mags. Because he did. Being so cocksure he could get her and Katniss out of the arena alive that it was worth volunteering.

Even if Mags thought it was worth it.

On to the Cornucopia. "Letting Katniss fall asleep was a mistake, but you didn't have many good options. This next mistake was avoidable. You didn't set a watch at all, and Wiress died. Everyone thought someone else was keeping an eye out, and so no one was.

"It was your responsibility to keep that from being left to chance. As leader, you can delegate, but you can't take anything for granted. If you walk away from today with one lesson, make it that one."

This is what Finnick needs mentors for, he reminds himself. Killing and surviving, that he can do, but leadership is hard. "I'll do what I can to strengthen the alliance with Three," he promises.

"Boy, you're not single-handedly responsible for-"

Finnick puts his face in his hands. "I said I'll do what I can."

"There's no reasoning with you sometimes."

"Can we move on?" Sitting here watching Mags die while doing the thing he did most often with Mags isn't making him any more reasonable, that's for sure.

He tries to get Rudder to skip the jabberjays, knowing damn well what he should have done differently there, but Rudder insists, and Finnick yields.

"Were you slowing down to look for traps at all?"

"No, I wasn't. I was panicking. What part of 'it won't happen again' did you not believe the first time?"

"I wasn't telling you what to do differently. I was asking you a question. We'll move on."

It's routine commentary until the tree. Finnick knows he shouldn't have turned his back on Peeta, he doesn't need Rudder to tell him that.

As the force field goes down, Rudder faces him. "Let me get this straight. You sprinted at your normal speed to the Cornucopia. Then you were slower than usual because you were carrying Mags and trying to stay behind Peeta. Then you were slower than usual because you were carrying Mags, then Peeta, and the fog was some kind of nerve gas. Then you were slower than usual when trying to come to Annie's rescue because..."

Finnick's heart starts to pound. He knows what's coming, but he hangs on to his denial as long as he can, even knowing it's futile. "Dehydration, lack of sleep, everything else that hits you. Have you ever been in an arena?"

Rudder continues, "Then you were slower than usual when trying to find Katniss and Johanna because...you were holding back for Cashmere? But not so much that you remembered your promise to keep her in your sight at all times. Then you've been slower than usual the last few days because you've been working a desk job, doing diplomacy."

"Maybe they should have sent you, since you think you can do better."

"I think I'm being lied to."

"Which part?" Finnick demands, his heart still pounding like a cornered animal. But he's still not prepared when Rudder literally corners him: whirls on him, grabs him, and hauls him out of his chair.

Finnick fights like his life depends on it, but whether it's the element of surprise, the look in Rudder's eyes, or the way Rudder pounded his defenses down before he ever lifted a finger, something in him snaps, and Rudder gets him pinned against the wall. Finnick can't move, and for once it's not his body refusing to obey him.

"I see your reflexes are still solid." Rudder's voice is ominously chill. "You forget, I've seen you dehydrated, hungry, sleep-deprived, bruised, and bloody, and I've seen you run faster than that every single time. I thought it might be the electrocution, but it was the fog, wasn't it?" When Finnick's breath catches in his throat, Rudder shakes him by the collar. "Don't lie to me again."

"My lungs. I'll kill you if you tell anyone." Rudder's completely unimpressed, so Finnick has to press. "Talk to me when you see me not getting my fucking job done. My job is protecting other people."

"Your job is whatever I tell you your job is. Are your lungs getting better or worse?"

Finnick breaks eye contact. "It's too soon to tell." He hates Rudder for forcing himself to break the armor of denial he's wrapped around himself for the last year.

Rudder releases him, turns away, curses. "Worse, then."

"What do you want me to do?" Finnick demands. "I'm still the best you've got. Who the fuck cares how fast I can sprint."

"Get some medical treatment? Overseas, if-"

But Finnick's shaking his head. "They didn't have a quick fix, they didn't even know what it was or if it was treatable, and I didn't have the luxury of months of tests and experimental treatments. I'll do my damn job. Jobs, all of them. Look, Mags died for this war. How many of your other soldiers have died, disappeared, been maimed...I don't need to be coddled."

"I never did approve of Mags' influence on you."

"What?!" Finnick explodes. "Because you were so much better off in the mentor department?"

Rudder looks bitterly amused. "Do you even know who my mentor was?"

"Your official mentor, the person you thought of as your mentor, or the person who actually did the most for you? Because in order, that's Donn, Octavius, and Mags."

Rudder is taken back.

"Yes, I know Octavius was your mentor and you've been visiting him regularly for thirty years. I know you thought no one noticed."

"I know Mags told you not to waste your time on him," Rudder accuses.

"She wanted to help. She tried for many years, but she could never figure out how. Are you holding that against her?"

"She didn't want to 'help'. She wanted to fix him. She gave up on him when she decided he was never going to be useful to her revolution. You didn't exist to her unless you were part of her strategies. She used people, and I never liked that about her."

"She used herself!" Finnick flares. Nothing, _nothing_ he's done has come close to Mags twitching in the fog.

"Yes. I did respect her. She didn't spare herself. But she thought she had the right to manipulate other people's lives, as long as she could justify the results to herself. I never liked the way she used you."

"She supported me! I was ready to go in at fourteen, it was my idea, and all you did was throw up obstacle after obstacle in my path. She believed in me, she had my back, and you only gave in because she wore you down."

"She adopted you and 'supported' you because she had plans for you. It wasn't your goals she cared about; she would have kept you out of the arena too if she thought she could. Why do you think there was no one to volunteer in Seventy?"

"Same reason there was one in Seventy-Five," Finnick snaps back, remembering that moment when Mags' hand went up, and there was no turning back.

"Same reason," Rudder agrees. "Because there was only one thing she cared about, and all she wanted you for was her war. I'm throwing everything I have behind this war too, you may have noticed. I've put both of us in the front lines. I don't know you who're calling coddling, but the fact that you feel you have to lie to me about a war wound—if that isn't her influence, I don't know what is. You still have one mentor, boy. I know it's not the one you want, but I wouldn't throw it away if I were you."

Finnick wants to keep being furious, and he is, but he can feel himself melting instead. Mags may not deserve this, but neither does Rudder. "If it makes you feel any better, I wouldn't have told her either. I still don't think it's serious." Then he jokes, "What worries me is that I must be slipping, if I not only can't lie convincingly, but you can outwit me. You're not supposed to be the tricky one."

Rudder snorts. "I have my moments. You think I have no experience seeing through students' excuses? But if I hadn't had feedback on your performance, I could have just watched it on my own without wasting your time. Now I'm done with you. I expect to see you in four days."

Four days with Annie. That's four more than Finnick had planned. But he's already here, in the bunker, he's not putting her in any more danger by staying. Still, he makes a token protest. "I think Pearleye is expecting me soone-"

"I'll send her a message." Rudder's brisk. "I've already arranged for Coral's return, she's not waiting on you any more. You mentioned my other soldiers? They get at least four days off every six months, so do you."

Finnick bows his head to hide the hunger in his eyes.


	4. Chapter 4

"Good thing you girls have me along," Ashe boasts, tossing another crate into the train like it weighs nothing.

"Shut up and load," Johanna snaps. At any other time in her life, she'd be hauling in her own share, proving she could keep up with the strongest men, but today she thinks if she stops leaning against the side of the train, she'll pass out.

She masks the dizziness by folding her arms as she leans back. A casual pose, a supervising pose.

He's only here, they're all only here, because of her, anyway. The men lying moaning on the ground, the men who'd refused to back down and yield the train they were raiding...well, they're only here because of her too.

Johanna has to hang on to her command or all is lost. She's only got half a dozen men and women answering to her right now, willing to fight off their own half-starved people for taking food that didn't belong to them, and willing to deliver it to the right hands.

If they turn on her...

"All right, that's enough!" Johanna shouts with all the strength that's left to her. "Board up!"

They need to get out of here before they get caught. Leaving behind a pile of crates, the team dismantling the barrier that stopped the train and the team reloading the freight all stop what they're doing and obediently enter the train.

Johanna pulls herself up into the engine. There's room for two, but only one seat behind the control panel. Through the door on the other side, Mickee is coming up into the car with her. She waits for Johanna to decide what to do.

Staring with fury at the arrangement, Johanna finally snaps an order at her. "Get one of the guys to bring a crate up here."

Mickee hops out again with a sprightliness that Johanna envies, and a minute later she's got something to sit on. "Ashe, make sure everyone's aboard. We pull out in sixty seconds."

"Yes, ma'am," and she doesn't care if that's mockery in his voice, she's got a job to do and she can't do it alone. If she could fight this war alone, she wouldn't be on this train.

"You're sure you know how to drive this thing?" she asks Mickee.

The other woman nods. "I used to take deliveries into Six. I can make the train go where you want it. I've even checked the fuel. I just don't know the way into Three, and I wouldn't want to lead us into enemy territory by mistake."

"I know the way," Johanna says. "Take your seat, then."

She's already on hers, clinging hard to the door handle. She needs to stay conscious long enough to guide them. "Kick me if I fall asleep and you're not sure at all. I'd rather be woken up for nothing than end up in the wrong place. Actually, scratch that. Just kick me if I fall asleep."

Mickee looks at her boss with concern. "Shouldn't we wait?"

Johanna knows better than to shake her throbbing head or she might throw up, but she argues vehemently, "We have to get this train to Four before they decide we've betrayed them. They haven't seen a delivery from us for months. If they have to come marching in demanding where the troops they sent us went and why we've been hijacking all their trains from the east and taking all the food and eating it ourselves-"

"Surely they'll understand about the plague?"

"No," Johanna insists, "we need to take the initiative. As a gesture of goodwill, if nothing else. And we need more troops, and I want them coming in on my terms. I wouldn't be doing any of this if I thought we could hold Seven ourselves. Now pull out."

Mickee obeys. "Well, I certainly don't want the Peacekeepers coming back."

All the long ride, Johanna grits her teeth and hangs on as she navigates. It's not bad enough she just crawled off what felt like her deathbed, sitting on a crate in a swaying train with no back support is fanning the flames of her back pain. But she's toughed her way through this injury for years, and today may be her most important contribution to the war.

"All right," Johanna says, when the terrain, which had flattened out, starts to get mountainous again ahead. "There's a tunnel coming up, in, I don't know, a couple hours. We'll stop there and rest. It's another eighteen hours to the border, and we don't have anyone to trade shifts with you. Besides, I'd rather travel at night as much as possible."

"Okay." Mickee hesitates. "If I don't know exactly where it is, we'll have to waste fuel crawling toward it. This thing doesn't stop and start on a leaf."

"Tough. I'll need you focused during the second leg."

When Mickee coaxes them into the tunnel, she thinks of another objection. "If we're stopped here, an oncoming train won't see us."

"They won't see us anyway if we're coming through at full speed," Johanna points out.

"Well, if we're both signaling...we should get enough warning to divert. Should I signal ahead the entire time we're at rest?"

Johanna ponders that one through her pounding head and wishes she were up to making decisions like this. Signaling will defeat the purpose of hiding here. But getting killed in a train crash will defeat the purpose of bringing a delivery into Three.

"If you receive a signal of an oncoming train, can you back us up quickly?"

Mickee makes a face. "Maybe?"

"We'll risk it, then. Make an announcement to the rest of the team that we've stopped and why, and wake me up at nightfall."

Johanna wraps her cloak around herself and curls up on the floor beside her crate.

She comes to without knowing where she is or who's shaking her, just gasps and shivers and tries to pull herself together.

"I didn't think you were going to wake up," Mickee says with relief, when Johanna finally lifts her head off the floor with a mental apology to her neck.

Johanna isn't sure she wanted to. It's freezing, everything hurts, and she's hungry, but she's not sure she could hold anything down.

"At least we survived the day. Is it dark yet?"

"It's darkening," Mickee informs her. "I wanted to get a glimpse of the terrain ahead before we leave. If you think we can risk it," she adds.

Johanna knows she's not thinking clearly. "Sure."

"And maybe you should draw me a map." Mickee sounds embarrassed but firm.

She doesn't back down even before Johanna's death glare.

"A map on what, exactly?" Johanna finally breaks, admitting that she's gotten worse again since they left. "You brought paper and pencils?"

"Or give me more detailed instructions."

"Hell, how do you give instructions with landmarks you only know because you recognize them? Could you give instructions in the woods?" Johanna sighs. "Stay as far west as possible, that should go without saying, but be careful of that one switch that'll start out west but take you over the mountain and back east. It's, fuck, is that the one with the lake? I think there's a lake in sight. Take the east one and it'll go through another tunnel and keep heading south.

"And once you get most of the way there—I don't know, six hours from the border—you'll want to hang east again, because there's a double track, and we use the east one for southbound trains and the west one for northbound trains. You should be able to avoid getting into a crash from that point on, unless there's a stopped train ahead."

After about an hour, Johanna has to shift off the crate, admitting that she can't sit up any longer. "You know the way," she mumbles. "Take it from here, girl."

* * *

 _Checkpoint ahead._

Mickee moves her lips in silent words that would have gotten her mouth washed out as a child. She's not quite to the point where she can say them out loud, but she's come a long way since she started modeling herself on the woman lying feverish and delirious beside her.

During the long boring stretches, she's risked reaching over and trying to shake and nudge Johanna awake, but she's unresponsive, and after a while Mickee stopped trying. This trip has obviously sent her into a relapse of the sickness that's been running rampant at Seven's main military encampment.

By coming on this journey, Mickee's putting a lot of faith into the vaccinations that came in from the east after the first wave of the plague, but Johanna's filled her with deeper fears of what happens if they don't restore the alliance with Seven. Peacekeepers, enemy troops, no more food deliveries, a repeat of the Dark Days...she'll drive the train.

But now she has to do more than drive the train. With Johanna out, she has to make decisions.

Navigating, okay, she did it with her heart pounding, but each choice came without immediate repercussions, so she subsided back into a dull dread for the long ride.

Now, though, she's staring at the red flashing message on her screen.

 _Checkpoint ahead._

Is she heading to the right border? If she is, who controls it? She knows what a checkpoint means; it means she has to stop the train and prepare to be boarded.

Would the rebels in District Three really have kept the old signals? Shouldn't they have changed something?

Prepare to stop at the checkpoint? Stop now and go back? No one else on this train has been to Three, or Johanna would have put them up here.

She's only got a pistol.

Mickee tightens and loosens and tightens her fist on her thigh, until she realizes she's tugging at a hole in her pants that she can't afford to make any worse.

If only there were some rebel code she could signal ahead. Maybe there is and Johanna fainted before she could pass it on. And what if she approaches without the code and it is the rebels, only they assume the train is in enemy hands?

She's only got a few minutes to make a decision before she'll have to stop within shooting range of the checkpoint.

Finally, Mickee stops the train. She's not in command, she has no command experience, she's not even a victor. But one last failed effort to rouse Johanna to coherence leaves her with the certain knowledge that either she's in command, or they fall to squabbling.

She gets out of the train and goes back to the car where everyone else is riding.

"Who wants to go do reconnaissance?" she opens. She knows at once that she's made a mistake. Johanna would already have picked someone. But Johanna has experience putting other lives at risk.

Ashe, thankfully, immediately looks interested. "Ambush?"

"Checkpoint," Mickee answers, facing him and trying to pretend she's here on Johanna's authority. "We need to know who controls it."

"We don't even know?" Wallace interrupts with disbelief.

"Communications broke down during the epidemic. A lot could have changed." Mickee holds her head high, trying not to let on that she's making all this up as she goes along. That she might be risking their lives based on two words that she recognized from her prewar days that sent her into a quiet panic. "I can't go, because I'm the only one who can get us there."

"Do we even know if we're in the right place?" Ashe's eyes narrow.

"Yes," she lies. "Now hurry up before they notice we're here."

"How are we supposed to tell if it's them?"

Suddenly an idea occurs to Mickee, and she kicks herself for not working this out in advance. Only, when they boarded, she wasn't paying attention to who else was on the team, just doing her part. Quickly, she scans the figures stretched out, sitting or lying, on the car floor.

"Neil," she says, and she knows as soon as she says it that her relief shouldn't be audible, but she wasn't trained for this, "wake up. Wake him up. Blue uniforms, obviously," she adds as they're waking him. The delay is giving her time to improvise. "But anyone can wear a uniform."

Neil sits up blinking and looking around. "What-what do you want?"

"Can you tell if Four troops are holding a checkpoint? We're sending you on a reconnaissance mission. Ashe is going with you to guard your back."

"Well, I don't have the passcodes or anything, I'm just a soldier. Johanna doesn't have them?"

"No one does," Mickee improvises, "it's been too long and we don't know what's changed. And she doesn't want to try an out of date one and get shot."

"Well." He takes a deep breath. "Maybe I can tell if it looks familiar. I only crossed the border once, and that was a year ago at night."

"You're our best shot. I've gotten us as close as I can. You'll have to follow the tracks the rest of the way. Don't get caught."

As she walks alongside the train with Neil and Ashe, though, Ashe surprises her with a sudden lateral move for the engine door. He's darting inside before she can stop him, and a few seconds later he's back out with a satisfied expression.

"That's what I thought." Ashe folds his arms over his chest. "This is all your idea, isn't it?"

"Johanna left me with instructions," Mickee bluffs, putting her own hands on her hips. "You'd better follow them."

"I don't think so. Or, I'll do the reconnaissance, because we do need to make this delivery, and I want to get out of here. But I'm in command," he says easily.

Mickee has to bite back the urge to step down and thank him profusely, because if there's one thing today has shown her, it's that she'll fight and risk her life to keep the Peacekeepers from coming back, but she really, really doesn't want to be in charge. But there has to be a chain of command. If it isn't her, then it's chaos.

"Johanna put me in charge," she insists. She did, she told me to take it from here, Mickee reminds herself.

Ashe isn't even angry, just casual. He tilts his head at the car they just left. "Look, there isn't a man in there who'll take orders from you."

"There isn't a man in there! You're seventeen."

"Doesn't matter," Ashe says. "You're a woman."

When she opens her mouth with the obvious retort, he adds, "And you're not a victor." He gestures to Neil. "Come on."

Neil looks from Mickee to Ashe and back. "You have any proof she left you in charge? Is she dead?"

"Unconscious," Ashe tells him, "and burning up."

"Resting," Mickee counters, "and no, but you'll see, when she wakes up."

"If she does." Ashe shrugs. "Let's go."

Neil follows Ashe off down the tracks, and Mickee sighs and climbs back into the engine, because he's right. It doesn't matter. She could go try to make her bid for power while he's gone, but he's so confident that it won't work that she has to agree. And she doesn't really want power, just wants everything not to fall apart on her watch. Just wants Johanna to come to again and tell her what to do.

Mickee slides in beside Johanna's shivering form and settles in for a long wait.

* * *

"Sit down," Rudder invites Johanna at headquarters in Three. He's gaunter than she remembers him, and looks about ten years older.

Johanna folds her arms. "I can stand."

"Sit down." This one is an order, not an invitation. Johanna spreads her feet so she doesn't sway and glares up at him.

"Advice from a former mentor. Pick your battles."

"You pick yours!" Johanna flares. "You want advice? Don't pick them with me." She's gone years without being able to stay on her feet except through sheer willpower. Picking fights gets her adrenaline going, helps the process along. If she sits down, she'll fall apart, simple as that.

"Have it your way." At least Rudder knows sound advice when he hears it. "I sent the train back with the rest of your people to Seven, and based on what I pieced together from your companions, forwarded a message on to Pearleye. If you can confirm it for me, I'll pass that confirmation on."

Johanna's breathing hard not only because of her weakness, but from relief. Everything almost fell to pieces, but maybe they can pull this off after all.

"In a nutshell, you need more troops because District Seven has gotten hungrier and hungrier, and less and less willing to watch food go by untouched as they protect the trains coming to Three and Four. Correct?"

"And the plague! If I hadn't been sick, I could have kept the troops from falling apart. But I couldn't get out of bed." By the time she emerged, it was too late.

"You were almost dead when you arrived. You were sent to a doctor and quarantined until it passed. You shouldn't be contagious any more."

"I'm willing to do whatever it takes," Johanna tells him passionately. "We need this alliance as badly as you do. We can't keep the Peacekeepers out on our own. We only drove them out with your help, and the only reason they've stayed out is that you're keeping them busy. I brought food—I know it wasn't enough, but I'll bring more if I can just get the manpower from you."

"About that, it's a very interesting fact that the checkpoint guards swore up and down that the train was empty when it arrived."

Johanna's eyes fly wide, and the chair in front of her rocks under her death grip as she keeps from breaking down. "We brought food! I wouldn't have brought an empty train! Do you know how hard it was-" Now her people are going to hate her for a gesture that didn't even work.

But Rudder's nodding unflappably. "As it happens, I believe you. I suppose I even have to thank you for turning up a weak spot in the discipline of my troops. They'll be punished, although not too severely, because everyone is hungry.

"Now, as you know, I can't authorize troops to Seven on my own, but it's good to have your confirmation. It's all Pearleye's been waiting on. If you'd died, I think she'd have sent them anyway. I'll send her word that you corroborated the story, and I imagine you'll have more manpower as soon as it can be spared.

"You're welcome to continue south, if you wish, but I'd advise you to go back to Seven and prepare for their arrival. No, I don't know how many."

Johanna breathes deeply while she takes all this in. It's better than she'd dared hope for.

But even expecting an arrival from Four, Johanna has to blink to make sure she's not imagining things when Finnick fucking Odair saunters over to her a few weeks later.

She's outside chopping wood for a palisade, because it'll impress on the men that she's doing something, and then if she collapses tonight and oversleeps tomorrow, she'll have some credit in reserve.

"You called, Seven?"

No, she's not imagining it. Even if that face weren't unmistakable, even now, only he's got that playful attitude. "What are you doing here?" she demands.

"I heard you were looking for some troops." Finnick waggles his eyebrows teasingly. "Where shall I put them?"

Johanna swears and puts down her axe. "I don't know, how many?"

Finnick makes an apologetic face. "Two hundred and ten. I wanted two-fifty, Pearleye wanted two hundred even, she's a better negotiator than I am. Or I was handicapped by not being able to use my best weapon, something like that."

Johanna half hears him. Two hundred ten, where is she going to put up two hundred ten soldiers?

"We've got tents," she tells him. "Most of the permanent structures in the encampment were burned down after the epidemic." Looking up and down what she generously calls a street, Johanna spies someone who should be able to make himself useful. "Stuart!" she shouts, flagging him down. "We need tents for two hundred ten people. Make it happen. Finnick, who's in command? Other than you, I mean."

"Quinn."

"All right, you give Stuart directions, and Stuart, you work this out with Quinn. Finnick, grab an axe and we'll have a briefing."

"So they sent you?" she starts, as soon as he's chopping alongside her.

"I volunteered." Finnick winks. "I always volunteer. You've got mostly men and women without families."

"And you."

He smiles wryly. "Well, I haven't seen Annie in a while." And for just one second, somewhere behind his eyes, it shows. Then the glimpse is gone, so fast Johanna wonders if she imagined it.

"I didn't hear you were coming. What did I pull you away from?"

"Oh, I was on my way back from District Two, reporting back for a new assignment."

"Two?!" Johanna hates being out of the loop. "What were you doing there?"

"That's where the front lines are now. Elspa's leading the attack from the west. Part of Plutarch's army is coming from the east. Eventually we may actually win."

Combined with the arrival of troops from Four, this is the first good news Johanna's heard since the plague struck. "So the front line has moved outside of Four?"

Finnick nods with fierce pride. "Our borders are secure. We didn't even have tributes stolen for the last Hunger Games."

"Oh, yeah," Johanna says, rolling her eyes, "everyone in the Capitol pretended a couple egghead kids with no survival skills were from Four. Or maybe they're really that stupid. Wait—not in Panem? Where were you? Where else is there?"

Finnick looks up, grinning, from the log he's dragging. "Very important top-secret diplomatic mission outside the country. There are other countries, you know."

She kicks his ankle. "Who'd you fuck?"

He sighs. "Honestly? I think it would have gone better with fucking."

"Yeah? Well, a word of warning about District Seven. Me in the Capitol is one thing, but casual sex here doesn't fly. Or it does, but it's complicated."

"Wait for them to hit on me? I'm sure they will."

She kicks him again. "So no diplomacy for you?"

"Well, it wasn't a disaster. I visited two countries, Ayre and Kedan, to ask for aid. They wouldn't send military aid and doubted anyone would. If Snow hasn't set off the nuclear bombs yet, no one wants to provoke him. But we're getting humanitarian aid. Pearleye wants naval help from the west, but we don't have any historical contacts with anyone over there like Thirteen did with Ayre for the last twenty years, so it's slower going."

"I don't need a navy, but can we get some of this humanitarian aid here in Seven?"

"I'll pull you all the strings I can. They're good to have. I was lucky the first set of field medics headed straight to the war zone in District Two, because there's this mutt I've never seen, all scaly armor and venom, and I spent a week in a hospital tent. They call it an armed digger. They burrow under the ground, and when you're walking by, they jump up and latch on to your leg. I was limping for weeks. And don't even try shooting them. They've been engineered to be bulletproof, and if you're going to stab them, you have to go straight for the eyes."

Johanna shudders, feeling the scorpio stingers sinking into her back. "But you're better?" Dammit, if he's walking around with her invisible scars, she's going to scream.

"Yeah, the medics were great. I can't even tell I was bitten. I'm going to try to get some to come set up shop here, teach us a few things."

Can she believe him? Johanna mentally sighs and lets it go. What choice does she have?

"So what happened to the troops we sent last year?" Finnick asks.

"You sent, like, thirty. The ones that didn't die in battle and didn't die of the plague got really unpopular and either went back to Three or went to hide in caves in the mountains so the war didn't get blamed on them. I managed to drag a couple out for the mission where we fought off looters from a train and took what we could down to the people who had ordered the food in the first place. Rudder said they were really hungry in Three and he couldn't keep his troops from looting the train either," she adds, a little defensively.

"Everyone's hungry," Finnick says. "It's not quite so bad in parts of the east, and Katniss has played a big role in that. But they're still hoping to get food from Kedan. Meanwhile, my number one goal, and yours, has to be getting your troops and mine to play nicely. Preferably, eventually not to think of themselves as your troops and mine, but as a single unit. That means you and I are going to have to work together closely."

"I know, I'm already trying to think what the best way to play that is. I was hoping for a woman, someone who could take orders from me without being given a hard time for it."

"Well, I definitely have no experience with getting a hard time for flying in the face of everyone's expectations and flaunting it in their faces. It'll be a good learning experience."

"Oh, shut up." She swats his arm.

"So give me a rundown," Finnick says. "Pearleye said you needed manpower, Rudder dispatched me with what we could spare, now give me the details."

"Are you civilian or military?" Johanna asks first.

Finnick throws his head back and laughs. "Whichever one suits me. One of the soldiers asked Rudder if I was really allowed to give the troops orders and not be part of the formal military hierarchy—which is pretty informal, by the way—and Rudder just gave him a look and asked if he needed that in writing."

Johanna's eyebrows fly up. She can just imagine. "More of that special treatment?"

"Practically codified in law by Mags." He smirks. "But I can't flaunt it. Heavensbee's instituting rules against fraternization, but I'm under orders to fraternize as much as possible. With everyone, impartially. Our line between military and civilian isn't as sharp, since we're hanging on to the militia identity."

"That's still sharper than what we have. They show up, we hand them weapons, we point them in the right direction. Getting them to follow orders is a little harder. Everyone wants to be leader, someone gets some influence over a small group, that group gets something done. Another group has a different idea about what needs doing."

Finnick shakes his head. "It doesn't have to be formal, guerrilla warfare is probably still our best bet, but we're going to need to build a more cohesive team out of those groups, preferably united behind you and me. I'll be sleeping in the barracks, for one thing."

"We don't have any barracks."

"We're going to need some. Mixed Seven and Four troops. It can make a big difference to morale. I advise you to sleep there too."

Johanna just shakes her head. She's insisted on a private room since they set this place up, and they'll pry it from her cold, dead hands. It's hard enough having to keep her back pain a secret when they're in the field. If she doesn't ever have a closed door to hide her worst spasms, she'll lose all authority she might have.

"I'll want to be introduced to these influential group leaders," Finnick continues.

"The biggest is Jack Glenn. He's extremely anti-Capitol, and he's got the biggest following, but he does not work with me at all."

"Sounds like me and Pearleye," he laughs.

"Is she convinced you should leave fighting and making decisions and everything that isn't cooking, cleaning, or carrying water to the women?"

Finnick blinks. "Uh, no."

"Then it sounds completely different. I have an extremely difficult time getting anything done here. If I weren't a victor with televised kills, I don't think I'd have any influence at all. Welcome to District Seven."

Finnick raises his eyebrows. "Is there a lot of anti-Capitol sentiment?"

"Yes, but not as useful as you'd think." Johanna rolls her eyes. "Now that the Peacekeepers are gone, everyone wants to go live in the mountains and be left alone. I've convinced some of them that if we don't help you guys out, the Peacekeepers will come back, but...there's a lot of 'this isn't our fight,' 'what the fuck is Four doing showing up with uniformed troops,' 'who the hell do you think you are,' 'what exactly are we dying for,' and so on."

"Is there any government at all? Is your mayor-"

Johanna shakes her head. "Down here, by the border, I had managed to pull together some miiltary organization just to fight guerrilla warfare against One and keep the trains going through. Then the plague hit, people died, I got sick, and everything fell apart."

"Is sanitation a problem?"

Johanna groans. "Everything is a problem." She hates admitting it, she wanted to fix it herself, but they didn't give her much choice. "There's been a huge backlash against technology. We take pride in roughing it. Every time I try to get anything from Three or Six, I have to fight for it and practically flog someone into using it."

"What makes you so willing to play along?" Finnick asks with a smile.

"I don't like having you here either!" she bursts out. "I'd much rather do it their way. But I'll do anything to fight back, you know that. And I don't know, I've been outside Seven. I like Pearleye, I like Rudder, I trust this isn't an invasion. But I can see why it looks like one if you've only ever cut down trees in the backwoods."

"That's why shared barracks are going to be important. What about communication? Do you have phones, televisions, wireless transponders-"

"No, no, and no. All the televisions got smashed in the first riots. The good news is, their propaganda isn't reaching us. The bad news is, I never have any idea what's going on."

"Let's get some down at the border, then, for our own use. If no one else wants one, that's fine."

Johanna makes a face at him. "Why do you like cameras so much?"

Finnick laughs. "Because I know how to make them work for me. Is there a headquarters?"

"No, we'll have to set one up." Johanna feels miserable, then blurts out defensively, "I killed Brutus." She can't stand the thought that everyone else is contributing more than she is. She talked under torture, and her district's a mess.

Finnick's eyebrows fly up. "Oh, that was you! No one I asked knew, not Plutarch, Haymitch, or Pearleye. We only assumed he was dead because he wasn't captured. Was this after the force field went down?"

Johanna nods. "Just as the hovercraft was coming for us. I drew the Twos off from Katniss after I knocked her out, and I led them on a merry little chase through the jungle. I didn't know if the 'craft was coming to rescue us or capture us, but I was going down fighting."

 _One Career._

She still remembers it vividly: the haft of her axe slippery in her sweaty palms, the whir of the descending hovercraft, the confusion on the faces of her enemies, the spray of blood from Brutus' throat. Then darkness.

"Well done, doesn't surprise me." Finnick pauses, looks at her with a little concern. "Johanna. I'm not Brutus."

Johanna's about to ask what the hell he's talking about, when she looks down at herself and really takes in what her body is doing. She's balancing on the balls of her feet, axe clenched in both hands, ready for the kill. With an effort, she takes a deep breath and stands down.

"Last useful thing I did," she mutters bitterly, wiping her sweating hands on her thighs. Her pulse starts pounding in her forehead, echoing the line of fire from her spine up through the back of her head. Maybe she can get away with something stronger than usual tonight. Maybe not, she's got a detachment from Four now to organize.

"What? What're you talking about?" Finnick looks baffled.

"You. Having to show up to restore order in Seven." She's scowling, seething with the humiliation of having to be rescued, _again._

Finnick chuckles. "Tell me more about how you can't single-handedly hold down an entire district." His eyes dance mischievously. "Every time I hear Rudder complain about being understaffed and underequipped, I give him a hard time about the miracles you've been pulling off here with less."

"But we had an arrangement— _I_ had an arrangement with Four, and I haven't been able to keep my end of the bargain."

"Man, and I thought I was hard on myself. I guess you don't see the requisitions for troops, weapons, and supplies Rudder's constantly pelting Pearleye with. I'll tell him it's okay, you finally had to put in a request yourself. Maybe it'll be good for his ego."

Johanna's met Rudder, and she knows Finnick's mocking words are pure silliness, but also that his teasing comes with sincere approval. She slowly starts to allow it to penetrate, although not without a final, half-hearted protest. "But he has authority, an army that actually listens to him."

"You mean the army he spent thirty years putting together?" Finnick queries. "And he wouldn't have done jack shit without Mags pulling the strings. You'd think I'd have been spying on my own? And what do you think she was doing at—what are you, twenty-three? Last I heard, she was still pulling herself together after her family died, not organizing any secret rebellions. Give yourself a break."

Johanna hesitates, because she doesn't want to admit that the approval of Four means something to her. Watching the playboy she gambled on having substance turn out to be increasingly omnicompetent has given her mixed feelings. Relief and resentment. What could she have accomplished with the kind of support he had?

But she's got support now. Even if it means ten times the work and less chance for self-medication, because there's a spy on site who might catch her at it, maybe she can get something done now.

Life is looking up.

* * *

Finnick likes working with Johanna, and he appreciates her work ethic, but she does frustrate him sometimes. He wishes she'd come sleep in the barracks, but she won't budge. She'll do hard physical labor, she'll work from dawn to dawn as often as he does, but she has her private room and she's sticking to it. He had a hard enough time getting the barracks established the way he wanted, mixed district and mixed gender. He could use Johanna's support, but getting her to do something she's determined not to is like telling the tide to go out when it's coming in.

So it's up to Finnick, who always sleeps with the soldiers. Sometimes in one sense of the word, sometimes in the other. One is easier because he can do it on demand.

He takes criticism for it, especially from the stodgier soldiers in Seven, but Johanna did warn him. He does what he has to do.

Cold nights are the easiest: they mean huddling for warmth, and very little real action demanded of him. And the cold gives him yet another opportunity to keep morale up with self-deprecating humor. "How is it possible to be hot and cold at the same time?" Finnick jokes to the room at large, as they bunk down for the night. "This doesn't happen in Four!"

He's used to the effects of sun, wind, and water in a temperate climate. He's not used to bundling up for the freezing cold, exerting himself, soaking his innermost layer of clothing, coming inside suddenly hot from wearing too many clothes for indoors, shedding the outer layers, and shivering from the light wet layer, even while sweating.

"Welcome to District Seven!"

"We come from civilized lands!"

The banter flies back and forth. Finnick makes a point of using weather complaints as a bonding exercise between the Four and Seven troops, but he keeps an eye on everyone to make sure the banter stays friendly and jokes about cold tolerance aren't too barbed.

Afterward, of course, when they're lying down together, the young soldier next to him teases sympathetically, "Teeth chattering? There's a cure for that, you know."

Finnick makes out with her agreeably while he mentally runs over her stats on automatic. Mickee Henders, twenty-two, used to work in a lumber mill before she drove trains, two older sisters and a younger brother left, parents dead in the riots. Part of the first group Johanna recruited.

She tugs flirtatiously on the zipper of his sleeping bag, and he obligingly pulls it down for her. He always does, when someone asks, even if his mind is elsewhere.

 _"I thought you were past that," Annie said, disappointed._

 _"Well, no one's holding a gun to my head any more. But my reputation follows me wherever I go. It's easier to say yes, than to say no and explain for the millionth time that the playboy lifestyle was an act, and risk hard feelings. I have no problem ending a relationship after one or two encounters; that's part of my reputation too. As long as everyone gets what they expect, I don't have to do any explaining, and I can get actual work done."_

 _Annie shook her head ominously. "If you say no, they should respect it. Sheesh, I feel like I'm talking to Cashmere!"_

 _"Why do you think I understand her? But no, I know I could say no, and I could enforce it. I don't, because it's not worth the hassle, and it's not costing me anything to say yes."_

 _"Yes, it-"_

 _"It's fine, Annie."_

"This is a warmer welcome than I'm used to," Finnick tells Mickee. With all his training, it's not hard to put the right amount of appreciation in his voice.

"Johanna says we can." She sounds half-proud, half defensive. "Johanna says women can do whatever the f-" She pauses, can't quite bring herself to just yet. "Whatever we want. We can fight, we don't have to marry the first guy who asks us...I'm even getting used to bossing men around! She's my hero, you know."

In the darkness, Finnick raises an amused eyebrow. "Did you tell her that?"

Mickee shakes her head, laughingly. "She's scary!"

"You should tell her," Finnick says encouragingly. "I'm not saying she won't bite your head off. But secretly she'll appreciate it. Like me, I appreciate the welcome."

"I'm getting used to doing things that would make my mother turn in her grave," Mickee says. "Besides, it's just you."

"I'm easy," Finnick agrees.

He lies awake for a long time after that. Thinking about Annie, about whether she's right. About whether he can stop even if she is. About whether she's safe. About Cashmere. About Cashmere, lying awake in the arena, holding him while he slept and dreamed of Annie. Cashmere again, keeping watch with Enobaria while her brother slept. Gloss, keeping watch with Brutus while Cashmere slept. The look on Katniss's face when her pedestal emerged. Johanna hollering at Beetee and Wiress after Blight's death.

Finnick's in the process of sitting up, giving up on getting any sleep tonight, when he suddenly stills. Something's wrong. He looks around, but the barracks are quiet. By which he means the noise of a hundred people sleeping in crowded quarters, but no unfamiliar sounds. No, what's wrong is something in his head. Some memory of the arena.

Something about Katniss emerging. Not the dismay on her face; Haymitch told him about Cinna. And she might not love the water, but she could swim, and it wouldn't have fazed her. In his mind, he tries to remember who she encountered when she hit solid ground after swimming through the saltwater pond. No, he can't be remembering right. His mind is just playing tricks on him. And it's not important which tribute it was. It's old history. He needs to go to sleep, so he can deal with the present. Seventeen of those tributes are dead. No sense in hashing over the details like he used to when he was training with Mags. Mags would tell him to sleep now, while he has the chance.

Finnick's still giving himself this very reasonable advice as he gets up and tiptoes out of the barracks. He's had his share of training in moving quietly, and he disturbs no one on his way out.

That said, it's still the middle of the night, and everything is locked up. Finnick gets the tape, no bigger than his thumb, out of his locker, but he doesn't have a key to the conference room where the projector is. Only a few people do, and none of them want to be woken up to satisfy his curiosity. Involuntary obsession, more like. Good, he can go back to bed.

Which is, of course, why he finds himself peering at the gap under the door to Johanna's room. A lot of light is shining out, so maybe she's having a sleepless night herself. Or maybe she sleeps with the light on, like Rudder.

Just a quiet, quiet tap then. Almost too soft to hear, but it's still followed immediately by a sharp voice rapping back, "This had better be important!"

"It's not," Finnick calls, and he starts walking away. Maybe if he just imagines Annie hard enough, he'll make it through the night.

He startles when the door opens behind him, and Johanna's flushed face appears. "If it's you, at least it's bound to be interesting. What do you want?"

"Just wondering if I could get the key to the conference room."

Johanna stands a moment longer in her doorway, then ducks back inside. "All right, I'm game." She reappears a moment later with a keychain. "Let's do it."

"You don't have to come," he tells her. "I promise I'll be responsible with the key and have it back to you in a few minutes."

"Oh, I trust you," Johanna says. "I just want to know what's got you up in the middle of the night. Anything good?"

"Not really. I just wanted to check something from one of the tapes."

"Which tape?"

"Just the Quarter Quell," he tells her. "Nothing that's going to affect us now. You don't have to watch the replay if you don't want to."

"You do?" she retorts.

"Some parts are harder than others," he says quietly. "This should be one of the easiest."

Once in the conference room, Finnick stands and paces while wielding the remote control, and Johanna sinks into a chair and shifts uncomfortably every few seconds.

It doesn't take long to confirm the memory he couldn't believe he had right. Katniss and Brutus meet each other head-on in the first few seconds of the replay. Then Brutus lets Katniss go unhindered to the Cornucopia.

"Whoa." Johanna stops her shifting and leans forward, interested. "He's holding back. Toying with her? Dragging it out like a cat with a mouse?"

Neither of them questions that this was the one victor with the best odds of running Katniss down on the spoke and killing her with his bare hands. And instead he went looking for his district partner.

Finnick shakes his head. "Doesn't matter what he was thinking. What was Plutarch thinking, putting Katniss next to Brutus, who had the power and every reason to kill her before she reached the Cornucopia?"

Johanna's silent for a long time. "Plutarch trusted Brutus?" she says in disbelief. "That much?"

Finnick thinks about it while he fast forwards through the District Two track. His two encounters with Brutus were inconclusive. Both times, Brutus withdrew after Finnick gained the upper hand, and Finnick didn't pursue. He didn't, _couldn't_ pursue or kill the Two tributes, because otherwise his own alliance would have no reason to hold together. There needed to be a credible threat in the arena in order for Finnick to play for time before the rescue.

Was Brutus playing the same game? Both of them had to make kills, or the President would grow suspicious and there'd be no rescue at all. The rebels had had to accept a certain death toll on their side, trying to play a numbers game to get as many as possible—but not everyone—out alive.

But Brutus volunteered. Then he talked shit about the other tributes and his plans for them. _But so did I._

He did it less confrontationally, but Brutus was required to talk smack. Finnick was required to flirt. Who knows what Brutus was really like.

On screen, Finnick slows the replay and watches Brutus leave Katniss lying semi-conscious and bleeding on the ground and chase Johanna instead. Johanna moves well over the jungle, slower than her opponents but smaller and more nimble. She may have spent most of her time on a river in Seven, but she's moving confidently through the dense undergrowth like it's the forests of home.

When the picture goes black, Johanna fills in the blanks. Not long after, the hovercraft started to close in on them. Johanna turned to stand her ground and face Brutus, with Enobaria coming up just behind Brutus. Brutus looked up, looked at her, looked up, and she killed him. "I thought he was caught off guard, that I had the element of surprise because I was expecting a 'craft. But you're telling me he knew we had to keep Katniss alive if we wanted to make it out? And he still came after me?"

"He had to at least stage a fight with you for the cameras," Finnick says. "And after that, when the force field came down and the hovercraft started to close in...I had orders to die before I was captured. Maybe he did too."

Whatever else Brutus might have been, he was a warrior.

"That's impossible," Johanna protests, "Plutarch would have told us. You told me who was in on the plan."

Finnick's convinced of just the opposite. If Brutus was in on it, he must have been in Plutarch's circle, and Plutarch never told Finnick anything if he could help it. Only in Seventy-Four had Finnick become fully aware of what Plutarch was plotting, and Plutarch of what Finnick was up to. In Seventy-Five, Plutarch and Mags partially merged their circles, but trust was never easy to come by.

Plutarch might well have seen Brutus as older and steadier than Finnick, just as he preferred to rely on Haymitch. Brutus' unpleasant personality—or persona—would have had as little relevance to his usefulness as Finnick's flighty persona, or Johanna's temper.

"We were all operating on a need-to-know basis. I figured out I had to keep Brutus and Enobaria alive as our cover until the rescue; he would have been smart enough to figure out the same thing about me." Otherwise he'd have had to turn on his own pack, and there might well have been only one victor left before any rescue could be staged. "There was no need to tell either of us about the other.

"It's the same reason I didn't tell you a lot of things, Johanna. Like why I needed info on the roads in and out of Seven. Not because I didn't trust you. But because you were even more alone than any of us in Four. You had no backup support. We wanted you to be able to tell everything you knew and go free."

"Which means you weren't?" Johanna challenges.

Finnick admits, "Mags and I had the ability to get nightlock pills secretly implanted in our teeth before we left, and the Capitol never found them. We couldn't do that for you, so I didn't tell you anything I couldn't afford to have you tell them. That should tell you we thought we'd talk. We're glad you did."

"It's been worth it?" Johanna asks, cautiously.

"More than," he tells her, honestly.

"All right. Well, you can have a key to this room. Come in here if you want to watch something while I'm asleep. It's not like there are a ton of televisions lying around."

Finnick takes her up on the offer. He distracts himself with the news when he can't sleep, and as often as not, Johanna's there. He doesn't ask if she has insomnia, but he can fill in the blanks.

It's not quite a standing date, late nights watching the news and chatting, but it's not quite not. Neither of them comments on it, but though Finnick's glad for her when he finds the room empty, he's guiltily relieved when it's not.

She only makes fun of him a little when he pulls his head off the table in the middle of a conversation one night and looks around blearily. "Man, if I slept bent over like that for three hours, I'd never sit up straight again."

Finnick blinks. "I was out for three hours?" Then he tries to sit up straight and discovers that, indeed, he was.

"Oh, does your back hurt?" Johanna mock sympathizes. "Finnick Odair the hunchback."

Chuckling, Finnick does a few practiced stretches and promises himself to at least sleep upright next time. As he's stretching, he can feel the ghost of his dream fleeing, and he reaches for it.

"I keep dreaming about Mags," he confesses. "I'm always dead, I'm in some kind of afterlife, and I'm looking for Mags and I can't find her." He closes his eyes, trying to remember more.

"Well, next time dream that I'm looking with you."

Finnick's eyes fly open at the sound of Johanna's voice. "Really?"

"If we're dead, I don't have to give a shit about Katniss." Johanna folds her arms defiantly. "I'll even help you carry Mags if I have to."

There are some games of what-if that it hurts too much to play. "I know you offered. I'll always appreciate it. But if she'd hit the forcefield...it's better and worse to know I could have saved her and she made her own choice."

"But if we're dead, we're doing it together."

Finnick smiles. "I'll try dreaming it that way tonight." Then he dares to bring something up that's been on his mind for a while. "Johanna, don't bite my head off, but I'm curious—how come you'll come here to watch the news and shoot the breeze with me, but you're almost never in meetings here? If you're having problems with the men taking you seriously, especially the older ones, it might help your cause if you're here more often. I'll back you, you know that."

"I do enough work!" she erupts.

"I know you do," he says, tired. "Tell me what part of anything I've ever said makes you think I don't. I'm trying to help. I'd like you to have more power, more influence."

"You're the only one." Johanna folds her arms. "But I'll attend the meetings when I damn well want to. And you'll keep going and reporting back to me with what who said what."

Finnick sighs, and writes that one off with the barracks. "You know I will."

"Say 'yes, boss,'" Johanna orders.

Finnick leans back in the chair, closes his eyes. Maybe he'll actually be able to get another round of sleep before dawn. "Yes, boss."


	5. Chapter 5

Hands on her hips, Johanna surveys the team she's put together. Mickee, Soren, and Ashe from District Seven. Finnick, Shelly, and Hudson, from Four. Layla and Wat, from Three.

"Our destination is up there." Johanna points up the side of the mountain. "We don't know what we're going to find, booby traps, mutts—hell, even Peacekeepers. The prisoners said it was an unmanned cache of goodies, but information gotten from torture isn't necessarily reliable." Johanna snorts. She should know.

"Torture?" Finnick's head snaps to the side. "Who tortured them?"

"I did, brainless." Johanna winks at him. "You should have been there, you know—I needed a Good Peacekeeper to play off. I had to play Bad Peacekeeper all by myself."

Her stomach still churns at the memory, but some of the voices in her head have quieted a little. Her prisoners broke under torture. That means she's not the only one. If she can only keep telling herself that, maybe she can find a way to live with the deal she cut to get out of captivity.

Glancing up at Finnick's face for a reliable dose of admiration and not finding it, Johanna hates herself for the sinking feeling in her stomach. She turns abruptly away, trying to hide her own expression.

"Give me the details later?" Finnick says, casually, but she's already seen that look of disapproval.

"Fine." She's been wanting to tell him about her victory anyway, capturing the surveillance facility that everyone thought was an abandoned weather station, taking prisoners, getting information. Finnick better not be about to start telling her to tone it down, abandoning Team Johanna Gets It Done, but shit. She doesn't care. "We've got a mission anyway. Everyone clear on your jobs? Layla, Wat, you stay in the rear and do your egghead thing to detect any traps or defensive capabilities that you can, and keep us informed. You don't go set foot inside any of caches until they're checked out. The rest of us neutralize any threats we find, and we carry whatever we find that's worth keeping."

She rolls her eyes before anyone can object. "Or I'll do it myself."

To the sound of indignant sputtering, Finnick steps forward, all command mode. "Have you been having any problems with any of my troops not doing their jobs?"

"No!" Hudson bursts out.

"I'm not talking to you," Finnick snaps, without even sparing him a glance. "Johanna?"

Wrongfooted, she repeats, "With yours?"

"Yes, with mine in particular. I know what you're used to. I'm asking if there have been any problems with the troops from Four that I should know about."

Belatedly, she realizes what it really means that this squad is made up of a mixture of Four and Seven troops, and why one set are looking at Finnick with protest in their eyes.

"No, not that I can think of," Johanna tells him, still flustered.

"Glad to hear it," Finnick says easily. "Then I'm sure it will continue to not be a problem." He gives a significant glance to each of his troops, and their grumbles fall silent.

Johanna plows on as quickly as she can, half furious with Finnick at challenging her publicly, half realizing he may have averted a revolt.

"I'm carrying most of our supplies on the way up." Johanna took on this role partly to prove herself, partly as an excuse if her back doesn't hold up. "Finnick and Ashe are our main pack mules on the way down, since I have no actual pack animals. The three of us are in charge of moving any large obstacles in our way like trees or boulders. Uh, why do you have a trident strapped to your back? We're not here for fishing."

"No, but if we're raiding a surveillance facility, even a damaged one, we may end up on camera. Don't worry, I plan on using the gun for combat, and the trident for photo ops." When everyone stares at Finnick in disbelief, he looks exasperated. "Look, I know you all think being photogenic just happens. Actually, it takes a lot of preparation."

"Fine, whatever. And what's up with the scarf? It's not that cold."

Finnick grins wickedly. "Not that I'd expect you to notice, but it matches my eyes."

He sticks out his tongue just as Johanna's rolling her own eyes, and he turns to Shelly. "But back me up here, it's freezing, right?"

"It's slightly nippy," says Johanna. Ashe snorts and nods.

"Definitely freezing," agrees Shelly.

Johanna keeps a straight face. She and Finnick take turns playing completely outrageous and being each other's foils, and it's surprisingly good for morale. Both the Seven and Four members of this team are standing around laughing as they watch the act.

With mock scorn, she sniffs. "I can't tell whether you're using your vanity to hide the fact that you're a total wuss-"

"Or using the cold to cover for your vanity," Mickee finishes, laughing. _Good girl._

"But I look so dashing in it." Finnick turns his head to the side, posing in profile.

"Crazy boy," Johanna mutters, turning away and hiding her smile. "Everyone ready? Follow me."

"Besides, you always wear long slee-"

Johanna's grateful no one can see her face as Finnick stops himself, realizing as he says it what he's just stumbled into. Great, now everyone knows. She fights for control of her voice and for a plausible comeback, when Finnick, the master of smooth recoveries, gives her one.

"But then, I forget not everyone has biceps they need to show off."

While he and Ashe are high-fiving and everyone else is rolling their eyes, Mickee adds, sounding confused, "But everyone's wearing long sleeves."

Johanna lets her breath out slowly. Maybe she's safe after all. No one else here is a trained spy, and Finnick did his best not to let the cat out of the bag. He knows now, though, and she doesn't know what to do about that.

Johanna's heart doesn't want to stop pounding, and it's not entirely because of the hike. Now she's got the marks on her arms to worry about keeping secret, and she's still hashing over what happened before that.

She doesn't like being forced to admit she's wrong, but no matter how much she racks her brain, she can't think of any case where any of the Four troops refused to do a job until she started doing it herself. But she can think of a hundred times when someone from Seven did.

She's never had any authority here, and the only way she's ever been able to get men to follow her orders has been to start showing them up. She wouldn't be here, this mission wouldn't be happening, no trains would be getting through, if she weren't in the habit of pre-emptively announcing that she's going to do something, before someone thinks she's depending on them to get it done.

But she doesn't treat Finnick like that, and to be fair, she'd be furious if he did it to her. The best part about him is that he gets his shit done and casually assumes she'll get hers done. She can't afford to alienate the Four troops either, not when they're her main support. There's a reason this team is a mixture of districts, ages, and men and women, and that had a lot to do with her and Finnick sitting down and handpicking its members, so that the ones who have reservations about taking orders from Johanna are outnumbered by the one who don't. And then she goes and jumps reflexively down their throats anyway.

 _It's just a habit,_ she thinks defensively.

Johanna's ruminations are interrupted by the sight of a handful of cabins in the distance. "We should see if they can tell us anything about what to expect on the way up. We went up the other side of the mountain for the assault on the weather station—I mean surveillance station."

But the door of the first cabin she tries opens only a suspicious crack. "What do you want?" A man's nose peers out, and she can see little else.

"I just need information on the terrain," Johanna says as quickly as she can. "We're headed up-"

"Whaddaya need 'information' for? You're not from here." His lip curls on the last sentence.

"Neither are you! This place was off-limits until last year. Anyway, we're on our way up to the old weather station and-"

"Not a chance." The door starts to close again.

Johanna whips her fingers into the crack and starts to push back. "I'm not asking you to come! I just want to know what to expect on the way up there."

"You're stupid if you poke a bear, and you're stupid if you poke a Peacekeeper stronghold."

"Are there Peacekeepers up there?" Johanna demands. "Still?"

He shrugs. "Don't wanna find out, do I? If you're so eager to do Four's dirty work for them, you do it."

From within the house, a voice shouts.

"That's the missus calling." The door closes.

"Typical."

Johanna meets with no more luck at any of the other places she tries, and she's fuming when she returns. "We'll try again at the next settlement." She's not expecting any better, though. This is why she needs Four's military presence in Seven, much as she resents it. Her district will riot the livelong day, but ask them to do anything _organized_...

The next settlement is the same, even though she splits up the team in hopes someone else gets better results. Finnick doesn't even get to try to charm them. Doors won't so much as open for him. "It's like I told you," he tells Johanna on his return, "With or without the trident, my face is too recognizable."

"Better get to work on that plastic surgery," Johanna snaps. She hasn't had any more luck. Recognizable or not, no one wants to help Four out on a military mission. "We stay on this path, then." Johanna keeps her _we'll hope it gets us where we need to go_ to herself. She's the leader, she has to be confident.

But before nighfall, their path runs straight into a rockface. Johanna thinks they could climb it, but not easily, and especially not with all their supplies. She sets them twenty minutes to try to find an easier route.

A deep gorge on one side, and a waterfall on the other, leave them staring at the prospect above, calculating the trade-offs. "Who's our best climber?" Johanna asks. "I want to know if we're better off camping up there or down here."

Right away, Ashe speaks up. "I can do that in my sleep."

Johanna half snorts. Of everyone she doesn't want to depend on, he's always been the least willing of this group to follow her orders. If he gets up there alone and then goes rogue...Johanna glances quickly at Finnick, hoping he's the best rock climber in the history of Panem, but she gets only a tiny head shake in return, deferring to Ashe.

"You're our scout, then," Johanna says. She follows it up with orders to everyone else. The thing about Ashe is that, for all his backtalk, if he's surrounded by a group of people taking orders from her, he's young enough and committed enough to the cause to go along with Johanna's authority. Glenn, just as committed and fifty years old, is a lost cause, which is why he's not here.

Ashe comes back with a report that there's a spot up there that's near fresh water and is more sheltered from the wind. He knows where he wants to sleep, and Johanna can't argue. Nevertheless, she quizzes him thoroughly before she makes the decision, making it abundantly clear whose decision it is.

They have to redistribute supplies before they can climb, and mountain goat Ashe ends up doing most of the carrying. Johanna doesn't like it, but like her, Finnick's an adequate but uninspired climber. He offloads half his pack to Ashe like he has nothing to prove and starts coaching Mickee up the incline.

Johanna looks at Finnick with envy, but because he's done it, she can follow suit without losing face. She's the last one up, because she stays at the bottom organizing and bossing until everyone's got a head start.

"Well done, everyone," Johanna says as they're finishing making camp and settling down for the night. "Extra food for our pack mules," she announces. "Finnick, you better not leave any crumbs unless you like sleeping with bears."

With a sigh, Finnick slides out of his sleeping bag. "Imagine the offspring, though."

"Terrifying," Mickee agrees.

Joining the others by the campfire, Finnick rummages through his pack. "Speaking of extra food, anyone like jam?"

"You brought jam?" Ashe can't believe it. "We're on a mission to carry important supplies, and you wasted pack space on jam?"

"That's taking a sweet tooth a little too far," Johanna agrees severely.

"No, it's better than that!" Finnick holds up the jar in his hand for everyone to see and slips into storytelling mode. "I got it this afternoon."

They stare at him in incredulity, and he lets the suspense build.

"Go on," Ashe finally urges.

"Well, when we were going through the settlements asking for directions-"

"You did not have sex!" Johanna cries.

"No! Have more faith in me than that." A beat. "I'd have gotten us the information we wanted."

Finnick lets them laugh it off, then resumes the story when Mickee protests, "You said they wouldn't even open a door to you."

"And they didn't. But one woman opened her window, shoved a jar out at me, and yelled at me to take it. It appears to be jam."

"Here in the middle of nowhere." Johanna shakes her head. "No one else in the world would walk out with jam."

"People give me presents, what can I say? They just fall out of the sky onto me, nothing I can do about it."

Mickee reaches out a hand, and Finnick passes her the jam. She samples it. "Tastes like gooseberry. Someone must have made more than they could handle and were desperate to give it away."

"Pass it around, then," Johanna orders. "Finnick, your life is a neverending source of amazement. What would we do without you to entertain us?"

All in all, she's pleased with this start to the mission. They've got people who've worked together, people who haven't, and a sense of camaraderie developing in the right direction.

As they settle into their sleeping bags, getting warm before they bank the fire, Mickee turns eagerly to Johanna. "Tell us what it was like working the log drive," she urges. Her voice drips with hero worship.

"Yes, tell us!" Finnick seconds, sitting up rapidly in his bag and glowing at Johanna. A murmur of interest goes around the fire, warming the part of her that only ever wanted to be taken seriously.

"Well. If you insist." Johanna picks up her canteen and takes a sip, getting comfortable.

"How did you get started?" Mickee wonders. "I'm sure you proved you were good at it once you started, but how did you get them to let you start?"

"Huh." Finnick again. "Good question. I'm actually really curious now, because no one ever gave me any trouble about trying anything, so it was always clear really fast what I was or wasn't good at."

Johanna humphs. "If you think they _let_ me...they couldn't stop me. See, when I was supposed to—okay, I was working the cooking train—" She sighs. "For those of you not from Seven, when the log drivers are driving logs down the river, there's a bunch of people on the banks of the river and sometimes on rafts, carrying provisions and equipment and cookstoves and whatnot, so the drivers can eat.

"And when Gran died—she died of old age, amazingly—it was me and my dad, and we had both lost our jobs taking care of her when she got sick. So I went and talked to one of her friends, and she helped me get a job on the cook train. And my older brother was already working a drive, only much further upriver. I barely knew him, he lived far away, but log driving was on my radar.

"So there I was, working on the cook train. And log drivers got first dibs on the food, because they were important and we were just staff. And they got all the respect. They didn't make a lot of money, mind you. No one ever got rich driving logs. But I could already tell fighting nature was more my style than waiting on the men fighting nature. And I had front-row seats on what they were doing, and I didn't see anything I couldn't do, or learn how to do.

"But they had this problem called quotas, and high injury rates."

"You know, that's why we save women from having to-"

Finnick erupts at the same time as Johanna, but he lets her speak first. "Working in a sawmill is dangerous! I worked in one, and my father lost two fingers and I was supporting us at the time."

"Come to me when you've done anything as dangerous as two arenas," Finnick invites him more levelly.

"Mason is obviously an exception," Ashe says stiffly. "That doesn't change the rule."

"We don't have that rule," Shelly informs him haughtily.

"I would say our women are tougher, but I've met your women," Finnick raises an eyebrow in Johanna's direction, "and maybe our men are just more observant."

"Your men and women don't seem that different," Soren says with a disapproving look at Finnick.

Finnick just laughs and grins at Johanna again. "Neither do yours. Anyway, you were telling us about the injuries."

"Yes. Thank you. The teams were always shorthanded. And once I'd spent enough time watching out of the corner of my eye, I'd step in and start helping."

Murmurs of awe.

"Unpaid, obviously. And being yelled at by both sides. The drivers didn't want me pitching in, and the cooking team did. When I shirked my share of the cooking, someone else had to pick up my slack. And when I started moving logs, I made everyone on the drive look bad. And I didn't bring home any money."

"And you ate how?" Soren asks in disbelief. "Your poor father was paying for your little rebellion-"

"Ha!" Johanna interrupts. "My poor father did fuck-all when it came to supporting a family. We ate because I took out tesserae. A lot. Everyone else took the bare minimum to stay alive, but I wanted the stamina to work a physically demanding job and move up in the world."

"A calculated risk," Finnick admires.

"It worked," Johanna says, a little defensively. "Anyway, I started doing the men's work, unpaid. They hated it, they threatened me, it disrupted the morale of the whole team, drivers and cooks. But the Peacekeepers were just there to enforce quotas, and I was helping meet quotas, and it wasn't technically illegal. So they didn't stop me. And I proved I could do it.

"After I'd saved a few underperforming teams by pushing them from 'not meeting quotas and getting punished' to 'meeting quotas and feeding their families,' and I had a reputation, I started bargaining. I'll save your ass, but only if you split the team's wages with me on payday. No, that's not good enough, you have to pay me the same as everyone else. Yes, that's my final offer. My family's dinner's not riding on your quotas."

"Well, after a couple temporary arrangements like that, I wore them down and eventually got a permanent team membership. No one liked it, especially my dad. He wanted me in the sawmill. But I was making more than he was, even once he started working again. I relocated downriver a ways when I found a team desperate enough to take me on, and he moved with me. Eventually he quit working and I was the sole breadwinner."

Stunned silence. "And they didn't kill you?" Soren marvels.

"They didn't rape you?" Mickee corrects.

"Oh, come on." Johanna gives Soren an impatient look. "Men have been known to bring their wives along. They don't kill you just for working the drive. Would they have saved me if I fell in? Hell no, I was on my own out there."

She turns to Mickee, a little less sanguine. "Shoving a dick up my cunt while balancing on a log while I try to drown you? Not happening. But grabby hands? Like I said, I was on my own. But then, we had to deal with grabby hands on the cook team too. Peacekeepers and district men. It didn't usually go as far as it could there, because the women banded together. Safety in numbers and all that.

"I gave that up when I stepped out onto the river. But if you have a pole, you have a weapon." Johanna grins, showing teeth. "I learned to use it. I didn't give anyone an inch, not an ounce of anything they'd take as encouragement, including being polite. I wasn't polite, I was vicious and frigid. And a lot of them wanted to teach me a lesson for that alone. But I wouldn't let them within arm's reach of me, and I said in so many words that if you pinned me down on shore after work, you'd better hope you could swim the next day if you turned your back on me. Nobody could swim."

She shrugs. "Maybe I got lucky they didn't gang up on me anyway. But they knew I wasn't bluffing, and they weren't willing to die over it. Most of them saved face by acting like they were joking and I couldn't take a joke, and we reached a standoff where they called me a bitch but didn't touch me, and we met quotas, and I got paid."

"So the girls here don't get to hold physically demanding jobs?" Shelly asks, a little condescendingly. Johanna is drawing a blank on the work she did in Four, but if she's here, she must be an ex-Career.

"Ha!" Johanna gives her a look of deepest scorn. "Have you ever tried dragging a cookstove over a riverbank in the freezing cold? Or worse, in spring time, when it's flooding and there's mud everywhere. No, we get physically demanding jobs. Just not prestigious jobs. You can drag the cookstoves down the riverbank, but can you be put in charge of the cook team? No. You can lose a limb operating a sawmill, but can you be the foreman at the sawmill? No."

"Then why put up with this shit?"

"Did you hear my story at all, brainless? Did you hear the questions? Did they kill me, did they rape me over it? You have to get all the women together to agree that it's worth dying to hold a job that's as hard and dangerous as driving logs, or all the men to agree to take orders from a forewoman without laughing. I thought it was worth dying over. No one else did. You want to know why I did better at log driving than men twice my size? I wanted to be there, they didn't. I cared more. Next question."

"So why doesn't your district have more victors? At least the guys get to be lumberjacks and log drivers...you should be Careers. Especially with those axes."

There's some snarling from around the fire at those words. "Career" may be a mark of pride where Shelly comes from, not here.

"We don't want in your damn Career pack," Soren answers.

"They had the first victor," Finnick tells Shelly.

"Really?" Johanna wishes she'd known this back when she was a tribute. Or even a mentor.

"Once we started having Career packs, everyone took Seven tributes seriously and started targeting them. And I guess you never wanted to be Careers, and without weapons training, a dash to the Cornucopia to get an axe doesn't pay off when you're in the bloodbath."

"What about your brother?" Mickee asks Johanna. "Where is he? I didn't know you had one."

"He died on the log drive." She forestalls Ashe's _I told you so_. "He died. I didn't. I don't know why they let men drive logs."

That one brings down the house. Johanna folds her arms smugly and slides down in her sleeping bag.

* * *

The second day starts much less eventfully than it ends. They get an early start, and it's a good thing, because the terrain gets worse and worse, alternating barren rocky ground they have to clamber over, and brambles that rip at their clothes and skin.

Shortly after they set out, Finnick breaks out his trident for use as a walking stick, and Johanna, leaning like everyone else on an improvised branch, wonders if he planned this. She wouldn't put it past him.

Ashe, for his part, is still moving like a goat, and smirking at everyone who isn't.

Layla gets annoyed. "I'm carrying a bunch of equipment, I'll have you know. Last I checked, you're not carrying any real weight until we're on our way down. You want to take my pack, say the word."

"I'll carry you and the pack," Ashe boasts.

"Ashe is for helping me clear the path," Johanna interjects. Her back is on fire, but her legs and lungs are holding up. "And as long as it's not Peeta clearing it, we're fine."

"Yeah, Johanna, watch out for force fields," Finnick teases. "You might need me to-"

"Oh, you could be so lucky!" she scoffs. Then she looks around at the rest of the team. "Wait, does anyone else know-Shelly, you have orders to revive me. You know how, right?"

"That depends." Shelly considers. "Who's in charge if you die?"

Finnick starts laughing, and then choking.

"That'd be me," Ashe says, like if he says it enough it'll be true.

"Then you're in good hands," Shelly informs Johanna.

Johanna sighs. "Unfortunately, there's only one other person here with real command experience. Bury me under a tree, I guess."

"So if we've got a qualified man, how come-" Ashe begins.

"Johanna's in charge," Finnick says, and he gets his coughing under control. For once he sounds deadly serious. "No arguments."

She's grateful for the support, of course, but after a while it dawns on her that Finnick's got more subtle ways of managing Ashe too. For one, every time she glances back, Finnick's busy helping someone who's having more trouble. It's nice of him and all, but she doesn't miss that it spares him from having to get into an out-and-out competition with Ashe.

Then, too, he's always the one to suggest a halt, yet another luxury Johanna envies him for. Walking in front, she can't see who is and isn't breathing heavily behind her, but no matter what, she has to try her utmost to be the last one out of breath, as they push uphill. She can't give Ashe an inch.

At one of the halts he's called, Finnick breaks out another of his weapons, story-telling. "If you all thing Ashe is obnoxiously show-offy," he opens, "you should have seen me when I was a teenager."

"I remember you when you were a teenager," Shelly retorts.

"Oh, boy." Finnick grins. "Were you there the time Hachet Face had us fasting and ignoring food while we fought, and I managed to grab one of the rolls and shove it down the front of my shirt? In the middle of a sword fight?"

He starts acting it out, holding everyone spellbound. "And he said I could keep it, but no one was getting any more food that night, and everyone was ready to kill m-"

Just then, a shriek interrupts him.

Everyone's on their feet instantly, except Johanna, who catches herself flinching away from the exact wrong motion that'll pull on her screaming nerves over her right shoulder blade. But as she's shifting position, Ashe starts shaking his head. "Catamount."

"You sure?" Mickee asks, relaxing a little. Soren doesn't say anything, but he shakes his head to himself and lowers his gun.

"What the hell is a catamount?" Finnick demands, still itchy on his trigger finger.

"That's what they call a panther," Shelly tells him. She shifts from one foot to another, looking uneasily around.

"Hmm." Finnick takes in the District Seven contingent and slowly decides it's all right. "Look at Johanna sitting there all cool," he admires.

"I've heard catamounts before," Johanna says, trying to keep up the unshakable aura. What would she have done if it were an emergency? The pain comes and goes, and her last flare-up is still wearing off.

"They sure sound human." Finnick cocks an ear at the ongoing screams. "But you're right, it's getting very repetitive. If it were me, I'd have mixed it up by now."

"Just because you never made me scream like that," Johanna teases.

Finnick laughs, but then sighs and makes a wry face. "That's the joke I should have made with the jabberjays. 'Someone screaming my name, I wonder who it could be?' Instead of rushing in blindly."

"But if she really had been in danger-" Johanna points out.

He shrugs. "Yeah, sometimes it's hard to choose between reacting fast and having a plan. It's always easier with hindsight. Speaking of plans, do we need to do anything about the catamount?"

Johanna looks in the direction of the sound. "There are a dozen of us, and we all have guns. I'm sure we can handle it. Stay alert."

"Keep an eye out for bears," Ashe adds.

"Oh my god, it's a grizzly!" Finnick presses one hand to his heart and backs away, but when Johanna turns quickly, he's pointing directly at her with a look of playful terror.

She grabs a handful of mud and fallen pine needles and throws it at him. "Very funny, Four. You're obviously all rested, let's move on."

She's wrong, though. No sooner do they start off, than the sound of labored breathing resumes.

Johanna feels faintly smug. Her back may have been hurting since her Hunger Games, but at least she can hike all day without feeling tired.

Then she hears a commotion. At once, she spins, ready for action—and sees a figure staggering, reaching out a hand blindly in hopes of something steady to grab onto, and then sinking to the ground.

Johanna's heart skips a beat to recognize Finnick. She's on her way back before she realizes it.

"Put your head between your knees," she hears as soon as she gets close enough.

"I'm fine," Finnick tries to say, but his face is ashen, and he can't get the words out. Grabbing one of his hands, she sees a blue-gray tinge to his fingernails.

Johanna nudges him authoritatively with the toe of his boot. "Don't talk," she snaps. She checks his breathing, his pulse.

"We need to get him to a lower altitude." Johanna looks around quickly. "Ashe, that's you." She wishes she had the option of airlifting Finnick, but she'll take what she has.

"Like hell! And miss all the fun?"

"I'll go," Mickee volunteers.

Johanna's sympathetic, but she has to be realistic. "Ashe, you've been offering to carry someone since we set out. Now's your chance." When Ashe starts to protest, Johanna adds, "Or I'll do it myself. And I'll make you all wait here until I get back, boy, don't get any ideas."

Before Ashe can fight that, Finnick starts trying to struggle to his feet, and he can't quite manage. Ashe growls under his breath but caves, and hauls Finnick up and begins the long journey down the mountain again.

"Altitude?" Soren says skeptically, when they're out of earshot. "Already?"

Johanna shrugs. "Once you've been at low altitude long enough, you have to reacclimate to thin air. He keeps moving all over Panem, in a different district every month, practically, and whenever he ends up here, he has to regain his tolerance. I guess."

"I didn't even think this was high altitude," Soren sniffs.

"I thought he was in better shape than that," Mickee adds, disappointed.

Now Johanna's stuck defending him. She can't have her troops thinking Fours are weak, not when Finnick's the staunchest supporter of her authority. "Look, it happened to Peacekeepers all the time at random, didn't seem to matter what kind of shape they were in. And I was vomiting on the ship all the way down to Four, and not one other person thought that was a rough sea. It's all in what you're used to."

"I guess."

The worst part is having to give up the supplies Finnick and Ashe were meant to carry. Johanna's information has her looking for two caches, one for surveillance equipment, and one for food and other necessities. But she tells her team to keep their eyes open for any other caches she might not know about.

They reach the first cache at sunset. It's in an abandoned mine, some two hundred feet below the ruins of the surveillance station she sacked.

Mickee puts her hand above her eyes and squints upward. "How did they get down here when they needed something?"

"There was a device with boxed-in chairs strung on cables," Johanna explains. "It collapsed when we hit the place with missiles."

Once the cache is deemed safe to enter, Layla and Wat go through it, exclaiming over everything they find. They immediately start wanting to pack up, but Johanna shakes her head. "Food gets priority. Once we've secured the area, we can always come back. Come on, let's go find that second cache."

Just as they're traipsing back out, they hear a distinctive whine. Johanna's first thought is that she didn't hear the cannon. Then she shakes herself. This hovercraft isn't coming to collect a tribute's body.

"What's going on?" Shelly whispers.

"They must be dropping off a delivery," Johanna guesses. "Everyone get inside, don't make a sound. Guns at the ready.

Without being told, Layla sets up a trip wire— _Clever girl_ , Johanna thinks—while Wat is readying lights to shine into the enemy's eyes. Then a sound freezes everyone in place. Aiming her gun at the entrance, Johanna can feel her pulse racing, but not a single breath is to be heard within the cave as the enemy approaches.

It's over in seconds. The first one trips, and the next two barely have time to drop what they're carrying and reach for their weapons before they're gunned down. Johanna takes no chances.

She ends up glad she left the one on the ground alive when it turns out he can fly the hovercraft. For a minute, Johanna considers leaving it behind anyway and coming back for it later, because it's going to be a lot of work keeping a prisoner, emptying the caches, loading the craft, and "convincing" the pilot to fly it down to where they can use it, without getting shot. It might be easier to trek down the mountain on foot, and make proper arrangements to come back for the supplies and 'craft later.

But then she remembers who's making the trek down the mountain as they speak. "All right, everyone, load up. We're putting everything in the hovercraft that Layla and Wat think is safe to move. Mickee and Soren, sorry, but you're retracing our footsteps. If you find Ashe and Finnick, tell them I've got a craft coming and send up a signal fire. If you don't find them, just keep going back to headquarters."

Food gets priority, but she's got a hovercraft now. Once she gets a pilot she can trust, she can come back and explore the area at her leisure. And they can't be roaming all over the mountainside, giving the prisoner chances to escape.

"How have they been getting hovercraft here under our noses all this time?" Soren wonders.

Johanna thinks about it. "If they wanted to be absolutely sure we wouldn't notice, they could have come from Six, gone way north over the wilderness, and circled down on us from the north. The border up there isn't exactly secured."

"Do we even have a northern border?"

Johanna stops to think about it. Not really, Seven just keeps going. Endless unmapped forests and mountains. "Nope. Everything to the north of here, I'm claiming for us."

Johanna waits a heartbeat for Finnick's answering quip, then feels stupid. "Anyway, I doubt they would have had to go to that much trouble. If they fly low enough to the ground, they could easily have avoided populated areas. No one who lives up here is going to drag themselves all the way down to the border to tell us they spotted a 'craft on their mountain."

Loaded with electronics that the engineers are drooling over, the 'craft picks up Finnick and Ashe on the way down. As Johanna suspected, they didn't make it terribly far with Finnick in the shape he's in. He staggers into the craft under his own steam, but not much more.

That's all Johanna has the opportunity to notice. She's busy keeping an eye—and a gun—on the pilot, a job she trusts to no one else. Her latest prisoner is pliant enough under duress that if it weren't for Finnick, she'd still consider going to the second cache and bringing food before heading down to lower altitudes.

No matter. She can work out the details once they land. It'll be easier anyway.

Mentally juggling so many logistical problems, Johanna almost lets it slide when Finnick wants to get straight back to work upon landing, claiming he's all better now. Then she notices that, even if he's on his feet, he had to pause for breath just to get that announcement out, and she sees her opportunity.

Johanna looks cunningly at Ashe. "Drag him to the hospital, make them check his vitals."

He's disgruntled. "Aww, come on-"

"Are you stronger than he is, or do I have to do it?"

It works. Johanna's just barely capable of keeping her smirk to herself as she strides off to find places for the prisoner, the supplies, and the 'craft. It always fucking works.

Then she's so busy it's days before she has a chance to get a status update from Finnick. She's seen mountain sickness before, so she shoved it off to the back of her mind while she got more urgent things done. But Finnick probably hasn't seen it before, so he needs someone to scare him into acclimating next time.

It's only while looking for him that it dawns on Johanna that she hasn't seen him in any meetings since they got back. She's used to that, because he's always on the go, but if he's around, he's usually pretty reliable about showing up. More than she is, with her need to keep her back pain secret.

So she checks the barracks, and sure enough, he's just emerging. He spots her a second after she spots him, and with a single glance, they both abruptly turn aside and converge on a spot behind the building that's as private as any they're going to find.

Finnick sits down on a tree stump; Johanna looms over him, preparing for her lecture.

But before she can get started, he's already asking her questions about how it went, and Johanna can't resist sharing her triumphs with him.

"Finnick, this is my second mission taking prisoners without a single loss of life on our side."

"I'm glad." He smiles wanly. "Did you torture this prisoner too?"

"Pff. Didn't see the point. He flew the 'craft where I told him to, I didn't think he had any information worth the trouble. The last batch of prisoners were sitting in a surveillance facility, and they said they were mathematicians coming up with secret codes for enemy transmissions. I don't know if they told us the truth about the codes, but I passed what I learned onto Three, and they can figure it out. Why do you ask?"

"Well..." Finnick looks uncomfortable. "You're not from Four, so you're not subject to our laws, I suppose. But I am, and I'm not allowed to condone torture. We—I mean, Mags, Pearleye, Donn, long before I was born—made it a war crime."

"War... _crime_?" Johanna echoes blankly. "What else do you think a war is, brainless? You do things to your enemies that you wouldn't do to your friends." Her voice rises as she gets herself worked up. "Next you'll be telling me we can't kill anyone!"

"No." Finnick looks tired. "We can. In combat, or when our lives are in danger. But we have to accept surrenders, and we have to treat prisoners humanely. I take it Pearleye didn't go over this with you?"

"No!" Johanna explodes. "Why would she? These weren't civilians sitting at home minding their own business! They were spying on us and passing on information to the military for the sole purpose of helping _kill us_. At least they're still alive. Dead is dead. And you're telling me what I did is worse than shooting people in the head? You're the last person I expected this kind of sanctimonious bullshit from."

What kills Johanna about this is how hard she had to fight to get through the rollercoaster that was her interrogation session. Remembering when she was on the other side of the table, knowing exactly how they were feeling, seeing red, wanting to make them suffer, fighting off the flashes of memory that kept seizing her without warning...it was hard to keep a level enough head to extract information. But she did it, the same way she toughed her way through two arenas, because this is war, and she has to be as strong as her enemies. Her feelings don't matter. And now Finnick's looking at her like she let everyone down?

"I didn't make this rule, Johanna. I'm just telling you it's one of the lines in the sand we drew between us and the Capitol."

"Well, fuck your lines in the sand. I'm in charge in Seven. Hell, Glenn would probably say I made the right call."

"Probably," Finnick agrees. But he refuses to say it himself.

A sense of betrayal builds up in Johanna, until it bubbles over into grabbing him by the shoulder.

The moment her arm crosses his line of vision, he grabs it before he can even process what's happening. With that, the fight is on.

It is fucking marvelous, it is beyond marvelous, to fight with someone who knows how this is done. Someone with the training, someone who won't whine that she plays too rough, and miracle of all miracles, someone who isn't trying to put her in her place.

It makes it easier and bitterer at once to vent her anger at him. The one person who's always not only supported her but outright egged her on. Who never minded that she was Johanna Mason, with all that comes with the territory. The one person she trusted with even a hint of her agony of self-doubt after her release from captivity.

"How fucking dare you?!" She wraps a leg around his knee, trying to bring him down, and slams her head against his chest, hard enough to bruise them both. "You sent me off with Katniss into the jungle, that was your idea, you told me to draw the Careers off her and protect her with my life, and I was captured and tortured! Not you!"

She's just starting to feel better when he does the unthinkable and lets her pin him. For good.

Johanna lets out a war cry of frustration. "You do not let me win! I don't need your help, and I don't need to be babied!" She shakes him. "Fight me for real, dammit!"

"I'm flattered you think that was me letting you win." Finnick smiles self-deprecatingly from his position on the ground. "But the last time you saw me, I couldn't even stand up, remember?"

"But that was mountain sickness! You should be over it by now. No?" She stares. "You overdid it that badly? I wondered if you were carrying too much, but I thought you had better judgment than that." Releasing him, Johanna sits back on her heels and folds her arms. "Well, new rule. Next time, you adjust first. I can't be saving your sorry Four butt every week."

Finnick doesn't argue, but he doesn't agree either.

"Am I going to have to bring Rudder into this?" Johanna presses. "I can't afford to lose you on a goddamn milk run."

"No," he says in the quietest voice she's heard him use. "He knows."

"Knows what?! Talk sense, man."

Finnick is silent a while, then he sighs, coming to a decision. "You've trusted me with your secrets over the years." Finnick's glance flickers toward her arms. "I suppose I can trust you with mine."

Johanna gasps, remembering the close call at the beginning of the hike. She grabs him by his shirt at the base of his throat and yanks him, hard. "If you so much as mention my sleeves again, I swear I'll-"

"Johanna, Johanna," Finnick interrupts her, not resisting her pull. Now they're both on their feet. "You don't have to threaten me. There's no need for that. I keep secrets, you know that."

"Do not! You pass them on your handlers."

Finnick gives her an impatient look. "On a need-to-know basis. Come on, Mags never even knew about your painkillers. Now do you want my secret, or not? You can blackmail me with it if it makes you feel better."

Johanna stares at him for a while longer. Is he really not going to tell anyone? Maybe. "Go on."

"You know about the poison fog in the Quarter Quell?"

Johanna's hands have gone cold with fear. Anger is hot. Anger is good. "Yeah, I saw the replays when I was in Four. Dousing you in water was the one and only thing Katniss or Peeta ever did for you, and I say it doesn't count because saving them got you into the mess in the first place."

"Well, as best I can figure, the nerve gas went one place the water couldn't go: in my lungs."

"Well, shit, Odair." Johanna's always thought that having to sit down for bad news was just a saying. She even took her father's death standing up. But she does sit down on Finnick's tree stump to take this one in. "Now what are we going to do?"

Finnick sits down beside her. "I haven't told anyone. Not even Rudder. He knew my physical capabilities down to the second, and he knew when something was wrong."

"No treatment?" Johanna says faintly. "What about Plutarch? He put the nerve gas in the arena, he should-" She gains energy and talks faster as though she can will a solution into existence, but Finnick is shaking his head.

"Plutarch didn't know anything. I didn't tell him, but I did sound him out without letting on. Plus I've kept an eye on Katniss and Peeta, and I haven't seen a thing. It's just me, as far as I can tell."

In the face of this absolutely insane urge to grab Finnick, thrust him behind her, take a bullet for him, anything, Johanna can only push for more information. "So if Rudder noticed, it affects you even at sea level?"

"It takes the edge off my sprint. I haven't gotten this dizzy just walking before. Rudder hasn't told anyone, and I'd appreciate it if you don't either."

"So we just pretend nothing's wrong?"

"I'd like to carry on being useful as long as I can. I mean to keep going on missions. Me with my edge shaved off is still miles better than most anyone else."

Johanna rages helplessly, because who else says things like this so casually and truthfully, and she meant it when she said she couldn't afford to lose him.

"You said you can't keep saving me every week," Finnick continues. "I agree. If I can't keep up, or I fall, or whatever happens, don't spare resources you can't afford to rescue me. I refuse to be a liability."

"What, and I just leave you to your own devices? I can't do that, that's Katniss crap! That's not what I meant."

"I'd do it for you. I did it for Mags."

Johanna flinches.

"Before we went into the arena, she made me promise to let her die on her own terms, for something that mattered to her. She was the one who poked me until I went back toward the fog; I was prepared to get her to safety and then go back for Katniss and Peeta."

"Bet she regrets that now," she snarls.

Finnick shakes his head. "She knew the risks. You act like I'm the first soldier ever to be wounded in a war. Mags was like me: one of the protectors, not the protected."

"Like hell. While I have breath in my body, you are one of the protected. Don't forget you had me carry the wire with Katniss because you wanted me rescued with her."

"But I didn't protect you," Finnick points out. "You were captured."

"You tried," Johanna insists, "and I don't forget that. No, you said 'be useful as long as I can,'" Johanna challenges. "Is it getting worse?"

Finnick doesn't say anything. Tellingly, he doesn't deny it.

Johanna grabs the nearest rock and hurls it at the ground as hard as she can. "Couldn't you have just said _Screw Peeta and screw Katniss's feelings_ and gotten the hell out of that fog as fast as you could? We'd still have had our precious Mockingjay. It's just Peeta who gets everyone killed."

For the first time, a hint of frustration shows through Finnick's mask. "Johanna, the one thing about this situation that makes it remotely bearable is the fact that Mags and I accomplished something that mattered to us on that mad dash through the poison fog. What part of you thinks I want to hear that I should have done anything but what I did?"

"Hello, I'm Johanna Mason," Johanna says in a falsely cheery voice. "Have we met? I don't go around making anyone feel better."

Finnick has to laugh at that one.

"I hate Katniss."

"It's not her fault."

"I hate you! Idiot with a fetish for self-sacrifice."

"Johanna, this is my job. Now, I mean it. Next time, if I can't get myself off the mountain, don't send Ashe. I can't be endangering anyone else on these missions."

"You're such an idiot." Johanna folds her arms again and refuses to promise.

"Yes, I'm an idiot. So when I go back to Four, can I tell Pearleye you didn't know about our torture ban, it won't happen again, and hope that convinces the council not to abandon the alliance?" When Johanna stares at him in speechless disbelief, Finnick shakes his head. "That's not a threat. I'm not even mad. It's a very real concern. We need this alliance, Johanna. Four needs it as much as Seven."

Seething, Johanna hunches over with her elbows on her knees. "I haven't even had time to think about it," she says helplessly. Every calculation about what she can afford to sacrifice for what comes up short against what Four has done for her district, and what happens if they leave.

"Think about it, then," Finnick invites. "If you want pragmatic reasons, you said it yourself, the information's not reliable. And once word gets out that we don't treat our prisoners well, they go down fighting instead of surrendering. Which costs us more lives, and we have more civilians and not so many soldiers."

"I suppose."

She's still thinking most about the cost of losing the alliance. If it weren't for her, there wouldn't be have been a semi-organized body of untrained Seven troops at the border. And if it weren't for Four, that semi-organized body would have dissolved during the epidemic. She'd have to rebuild her authority from scratch, and it wouldn't be anything like what she has now, as much as she complains about it. And if it weren't for Four taking the brunt of the Capitol's military might, and deploying troops to attack District Two, Seven would be crushed under the heels of Peacekeeper boots. Johanna can't kid herself about that.

But she can't just surrender, can't take orders from a foreign power. The fact that some part of her would be relieved at never having to go through that afternoon with the prisoners again just makes her more determined not to give in easily.

"I'm willing to dicker. I won't torture prisoners, if you won't be a blockhead again about altitude."

Finnick gives her a long, reluctant look.

"Do you want this alliance or not?" she snaps. "Or maybe I should ally with Rudder until you give in."

"No, all right," Finnick yields. "Normally I wouldn't hesitate, but I'm just afraid it may be permanent. I don't want to hold you back. Maybe you should just leave me-"

"That's your deal," Johanna interrupts. "Take it or leave it." She's half glad he's arguing, because when he gives in, she'll get that rush of pleasure from having the upper hand.

She knows Finnick. He concedes with a nod, and one of the best moments in her life is his hand in hers, agreeing that the alliance is still on.


	6. Chapter 6

Peeta's the first person Finnick looks up in District Thirteen when he has a moment to spare from business. Being in the place where he's had so many conflicts with Plutarch makes him feel weird, but he tells himself he's just lucky that the last one ended in his freedom to move about District Thirteen.

"You're back!" Peeta greets him with a huge grin. "I was just on my way to bed, but come on, we can catch up. Are you staying?"

"I can't," Finnick explains, following Peeta toward his room. "Rudder sent me to work out materiel delivery with General Heavensbee. I have to go back once I'm done, and then I have to pick up the mission-critical work I left off. And I doubt I'd be welcome here anyway. If I didn't have Four backing me, I wouldn't have been allowed past the border. Does anyone here not hate me?"

"I don't."

"Gale's dead," Finnick continues, barely hearing, "Heavensbee's obstructing me as much as he can without outright making an enemy of Four at a time like this, and I'm afraid to go looking up Katniss."

"Oh, I wouldn't say she hates you," Peeta demurs. He closes the door and invites Finnick to sit down. There's no furniture but the bed, but it's a proper bed, and they sit down side by side.

"She treats me like a leper."

"But she does that with everyone. It takes her a long time to warm up to anyone who isn't Prim."

Finnick raises his eyebrows skeptically. "That's what Gale said."

"You just have to stick it out until she gets to know you. I'm the nice one, I don't make you work for it," Peeta says. The bitter edge he sometimes sees from Peeta shows through again. "She hit me the first time I said I was in love with her."

"I saw," Finnick tells him. "I was there, remember? I was mentoring that year."

The interviews with the tributes from Four were well over, but Finnick was hanging around backstage, flirting with the escort from Eleven while keeping an eye on the tributes in case he learned anything he could tell his kids about their opponents. Spy instincts he didn't even think about any more.

"You see? Stop pushing her away and she'll warm up to you. She still hates owing anyone anything, like I told you, and she doesn't quite know what to do with your reputation, but she doesn't hate you.

"She has a lot of feelings. I don't think she's as angry about being manipulated any more. She's resigned to the war these days. But she's still upset about the way you approached her, and she feels bad about Mags, and she feels sorry for you, and she doesn't feel she can trust you, because you're always telling a different story..."

"Wow." Finnick takes a deep breath, tries to think where to start. "Can you please tell her, if she's not going to give me the chance, that the only reason I came up behind her at the rope station and put my arms around her was because she wasn't taking my hints at the chariot, and I needed to whisper in her ear that we had a rescue plan? But she moved before I had the chance, and then she ignored every single attempt I made to bond with her that wouldn't look suspicious on camera.

"When it's not life or death, I don't touch people, they touch me, and I don't say no because my family dies if I do. If you're not hitting on me, you're safe. I'm sorry she was the one exception. The Quarter Quell broke every single rule."

Finnick sighs and looks at the ground. "Starting when I was fourteen," he says, slowly. "I had to do what I had to do. And I had to make sure everyone despised me. I always thought that once I announced I was spying the whole time, everyone would be impressed, blown away. Mags warned me it wouldn't happen overnight. I didn't believe her, but I guess I should be used to this by now."

"I'm impressed," Peeta says, like he knows it's not what Finnick is looking for, but offering it anyway.

Finnick smiles, touched. Mags was impressed, he tells himself. He just needs to keep reminding himself of that.

"And I'll tell her, about the rope station. But to be honest, I don't think that's your biggest problem. Katniss is more guilty than angry over what you did after that. I tried telling her what you said about paying debts forward, but...you have to stick around."

"I would if I could," Finnick sighs. It used to be the truth, anyway. There was nothing he wanted more at first than to be working with Katniss, getting to know each other, learning to trust each other. Without any headway, though, it just hurts too damn much. Annie at her most panicked and asking him to leave is kinder, and Johanna at her prickliest makes it clear she can tolerate working with him better than anyone else she's got. But he does feel sorry for Peeta. "No ulterior motives in saying that?" he teases.

Peeta gives him a look of unguarded honesty. "To tell you the truth, I wish my older brothers had been more like you. I guess we were all just trying to stay alive. But they never took an interest in me, and you did, and...I know you have places to be, but I can wish, can't I?"

"We can all wish," Finnick tells him, wishing at least he could do better by Peeta. Even now, he's sitting here wallowing in his loneliness instead of remembering how much worse Peeta has it. "I'm sorry, I never asked about your family."

Peeta just shakes his head sorrowfully. "I never really had a family, and now all I have are the Everdeens. They've kind of adopted me. Her mother's kinder to me than mine was. And this girl I grew up with, we're getting to be friends again."

His heart breaks for Peeta. "What about Haymitch?"

"Haymitch." Peeta nods. "And you. Sometimes, it's hard, knowing everyone only took care of me for Katniss's sake. It's not like that's not what I wanted, even insisted on. It's just...sometimes what you know and what you feel are different."

Finnick understands that all too well. He wraps Peeta's hand in his. "The hovercraft had to pick up Katniss and flee, but I was going to stay with you at the tree."

"I wish I'd known then that I could trust you," Peeta says ruefully. "What about your family, are they safe?"

"Annie's still in hiding. I hardly ever get to see her. My parents, cousins, aunts and uncles...I hope they're okay. We're not really on speaking terms."

At Peeta's shock, Finnick explains, "They were part of the price I paid for my spywork. I always looked like one of the enemy to them."

"But surely when you-"

Finnick shakes his head. "None of us were willing to bend enough. It's fine. Annie's what matters. I'm glad she's safe, I hope Four can keep her that way, but it's hard not getting to see her. Like you said, what you know and what you feel."

Just then, the door opens. Katniss stares at Finnick's hand holding Peeta's.

"Not you too!" Katniss exclaims in disgust at Peeta.

Finnick takes his cue from Peeta, who keeps his hand where it is and his voice unapologetic. "He was telling me about Annie."

"Oh? Did did he tell you about Cashmere?"

Finnick's smile tightens on his face. "Is it Gale or Cinna you're upset over?" He knows he shouldn't taunt Katniss, but he's having a bad day, and the only way he's survived this long is by being completely unrepentant in the face of everyone judging him.

"Cinna too?!" Katniss is horrified.

"Really?" Peeta glances at him curiously, blinking like he's trying to adjust to this revelation.

"That's it. Peeta, come away from there!"

Peeta looks undecided. Finnick makes the decision for him. He releases Peeta's hand and gives him a nudge.

Peeta goes to Katniss, and Finnick makes to leave.

"We were just talking-" he hears Peeta protest softly to Katniss.

"I know," she says, even more softly. Out of habit, Finnick moves casually and quietly, like he's not straining his ears. "And I trust you. But he can't help it. General Heavensbee-"

Oh, really? Well, one thing he can't help right now is lashing back. "You and General Heavensbee were talking about me?"

Katniss whirls, startled, and blushes. "No, I-he—never mind."

Finnick settles in the doorway, arms folded. "No, tell me."

"No-"

Peeta tries to step between them. "It's all right, I was just telling him he was like a brother-"

"He was saying I can't help it?" Finnick continues, staring implacably at Katniss. He can fill in the blanks, it's nothing he hasn't heard. "That I'll have sex with anyone who asks, that 'no' isn't in my vocabulary?"

Katniss is stammering and trying to interrupt him. "I'm sorry, I shouldn't have said anything."

"But you did. Do tell."

She shakes her head, but when he says in his command voice, "Tell. Me!" her chin comes up and her eyes flash.

"Fine! He said it was involuntary when it started, but you were too young, it became part of you." Katniss looks abashed when she says this, but also stubborn, sticking to her guns.

"So, now you have to protect everyone from me? Lock up your boyfriend, shun me because you're too busy being protective of Annie to worry about what Annie actually thinks?

"I don't owe you an explanation, but if it makes you feel better," he snaps, "Annie's getting more action with Cashmere these days than I am."

That startles both Katniss and Peeta, and for once, she can't think of anything to say in response. "I told you Annie's in hiding," he explains to Peeta. "Cashmere was kind enough to agree to be her bodyguard, and-" Finnick laughs, "they hit it off." _I'm practically an afterthought these days._ Then he's ashamed of his self-pity. He's happy for them. He just misses them, that's all.

"Look, Finnick." Katniss takes a step toward him. "I'm sorry. You know I would have done anything to protect my sister. It's just-" She looks apologetic, but Finnick doesn't miss the way she stepped in front of Peeta to say this.

"You don't blame me, but you don't trust me with your boyfriend either? Yeah, I see. Peeta, it was nice chatting. If you ever need an older brother again, hit me up."

Peeta makes a sound like he's about to say something, but Finnick's had all he can take. He turns and makes his exit without another word.

* * *

After District Thirteen, it's a relief to get back to Three and see the approval on Rudder's face as he delivers his report, trying not to calculate the time that's passed since he last saw Annie and decide if it's too soon to risk exposing her again.

"Less than I'd hoped," Rudder concludes when he's reviewed the paperwork and heard the update, "but I'm sure no one else could have gotten this much. Will you stay through the truce, or are you on your way to Seven or Four?"

"Truce?" This is the first Finnick's heard.

"Ah, you came straight to me? We negotiated a ceasefire for the Games," Rudder explains. "They want us to watch, and I...I don't know if it's a good idea, but there was a popular demand not to let the kids die without a vigil. And we're running short enough on weapons that it'll buy us some time."

"Oh, damn," Finnick says, "it's the Hunger Games again, isn't it? Sorry, I've been traveling, and everything's censored in Thirteen. So every district got reaped again?"

"Every one but Four," Rudder confirms, "and four kids from Three again."

Finnick just shakes his head. It's such a farce, passing off Three kids as tributes from District Four, just so the Capitol can pretend they're in complete control. Everyone knows—and that's the point too, he guesses. Ally with Four, and you'll be punished.

"Are you planning on watching?" Finnick asks quietly.

Rudder gives him that inscrutable look Finnick knows so well. "If it were me...I'd want someone to watch."

Finnick nods. "I imagine we'll be busy trying to make the most of the truce; highlights in the evening?"

"Exactly. Johanna Mason will be joining us, for the same reasons."

"Oh?" Finnick feels his face light up. "Johanna's here?"

"We've been working out details of manning our joint border for the last couple of weeks. She decided to stay through the ceasefire. What about you, settling down here for some time?"

The temptation is a physical ache in his chest. "I think I'd better keep busy," he forces out. "It's better this way."

Rudder studies him. Finnick doesn't know quite what emotion he should be reading behind that neutral expression, but he thinks maybe concern.

"How are you holding up?" Rudder asks steadily, confirming it.

"Just tired," Finnick answers. "Lately I've been in a different district every day, it feels like." _Please don't tempt me with Annie._

"Take what rest here you need, then," Rudder advises, but he doesn't push. "Johanna and I will see you tonight."

* * *

"Finnick! Where the fuck have you been?"

Finnick looks up from his knitting to see Johanna charging in. He slept so long there was no point in doing anything else, so he headed straight to the room where they'll be watching the Games, and waited for the others.

"Four and Three needed more weapons and other materials that you can only get in the east," he explains. "I had to go arrange a delivery."

"That's dandy, but you need to let me know when you're leaving Seven. I turn around and you're gone, and it's a huge hassle."

Finnick blinks. "I didn't think you'd notice if I wasn't there."

"I noticed," Johanna says shortly. "I can't be counting on you for something and not know how to find you or when I can expect to see you again."

"Sorry," he says. "I didn't mean to leave you in the lurch."

"Don't let it happen again." Johanna sits down across from him. "And what in the world are you doing now?"

"Watching the Hunge-"

"No, I mean that." She gestures toward his hands, and Finnick follows her gaze down to his yarn and needles.

He turns his confusion into a joke. "I hate to break it to you, but your district's ridiculously cold, and it's already fall. I borrowed a pattern for mittens, because this winter I mean to be ready."

Johanna blinks, and shakes herself. "All right," she says faintly, and comes over to sit next to him. "Do men knit where you come from?"

Hearing the disbelief in her voice, Finnick looks up again from his handiwork and matches her shock with his own. "What, men have rules too? I thought it was just women."

"You wish. Women get the boring work, and men have to avoid it if they want respect."

"I like knitting," Finnick insists. It gives him something to do with his hands, and sometimes that's enough to keep the restlessness from setting in.

"Well, I guess I'm the last one to talk," Johanna says with an elaborate shrug. "Only I always felt like I was moving up in the world when I decided to be one of the guys. Just be aware that your reputation's going to take a hit."

Finnick rolls his eyes. "Should I tell them to go fuck themselves?" But what he's really thinking is _not again_ , not after a decade of being a playboy, and Plutarch's unconscious lip twitch every time he saw Cashmere, and the wall of politeness in Three, and being an outlander in Seven who's willing to take orders from a woman. His respect is already precarious in Seven. Not again.

"Worked for me," Johanna said. She shakes herself again, harder this time. "Sorry, I'll get a fucking grip. I guess I'm from Seven after all, even if I decided to do the opposite of what everyone expected." Then she laughs, harshly. "I take the heat for being too masculine, and you for not being masculine enough."

"I'm used to it," is all he has time to say before Rudder comes in.

"Ready?" Rudder asks.

"It's Seventy-Seven and we're still having Hunger Games," Finnick complains.

"Why are we watching?" Johanna explodes. "We didn't have enough of that when there were Peacekeeper collies nipping at our heels to make sure we watched?"

"We can't counter their propaganda with our own, unless we know what they're putting in theirs," Finnick argues.

"Finnick," Johanna cries, "did you even watch the lead-up to this year's Games?"

Finnick shakes his head. "Just got here. I didn't have the chance."

"It's Ashe! I don't know the girl, but it's Ashe."

Finnick pretends to drop a stitch. He looks down, faking repairing it while he gets his mask on. Damn. He remembers leaning on the boy's shoulder on the way down the mountain. "He's still eighteen?" What a useless thing to say, but that's all that comes to mind in the first bleak shock of grief.

"Who the hell knows. One of the Six kids spent his interview crying that he was only ten."

It's not like reapings are organized any more.

"Interviews were a disaster," Rudder elaborates. "Caesar spent the whole time with the outlier districts building up a sob story about how sad it is that they have no mentors, because their districts have abandoned them to their fates."

They must not have sponsors either, Finnick reasons. Only Districts One and Two are going to be allowed victors, as a reward for their loyalty and an enticement to rebellious districts. The other districts are being included because the Capitol cannot admit they don't control the whole country. As long as the Hunger Games are on, the rebels can't claim they've won anything.

So when Finnick, Johanna, and Rudder sit down to watch the bloodbath, they know Ashe is dead.

"What are they going to do if the One and Two tributes all die before the Gamemakers can step in?" Johanna demands. "Ashe has military training. He's been in combat."

Finnick and Rudder exchange a look. "I'd bet all four of the Pack have," Finnick says. "One and Two troops are coming out of the Career academies just like Four troops. The Gamemakers aren't going to let him win. If there's an earthquake and a flood, they'll gas him before they let him outswim the boy from One."

On screen, the first tribute emerges into the arena, and the audience gets to see it for the first time.

Finnick and Johanna gasp. The Cornucopia is at the top of a boulder in the middle of the arena. The tributes will have to climb for it. In front of each pedestal is a climbing harness, rope, and all the other equipment necessary.

"District Two," Finnick says. They're practically guaranteed a win this year. The Gamemakers must be alternating. It reduces the suspense to effectively two tributes, and One must be pissed off that they don't stand a chance this year, but it at least keeps the two loyal districts from thinking the Capitol is playing favorites. He has a suspicion if Two wins this year, they won't send volunteers next year, or at least not their strongest, and One will catch on and adopt the same strategy the following year. If they haven't already.

"But Ashe can climb!" Johanna protests. "You know he can."

Rudder just shakes his head without a word.

"I know they're not going to let him win!" Johanna's face is bright red with fury. "But this is the first time I've had a tribute who would have had a chance in a normal year."

Finnick just looks at Rudder. This is the first time Finnick's known one of the tributes, really known him. Sparring at the academy doesn't count, not when Finnick wasn't a proper mentor.

 _You once said I needed a mentor,_ Finnick's look says. _You may have been more right than you knew._

Rudder gives him a steadying look, and Finnick turns to Johanna. "He's a soldier," he tries to reassure her. "This is a battle. If he can kill even one-"

He doesn't understand why Johanna, far from being reassured, leaps to her feet, shaking hard. "He can take at least one Career with him, is what you're saying." She's almost hysterical now. "I bet he can!"

"I'm saying we're at war," Finnick says, trying to calm her and keep calm himself. "He's fighting for his district and his people as much as he would be if he died in battle on the ground in Seven. We can make this death mean something."

Johanna looks at him with a wild, pleading look, and he's helpless to change anything for her. He can help her work this into propaganda in Seven. That's all.

Finally, her breaths coming faster, she sinks slowly back into her chair and looks at the screen.

The countdown has ended and the tributes are racing from their pedestals.

Districts One and Two have found each other at the Cornucopia and paired off, Two climbing, One belaying. If the Two tributes get to the top and don't push supplies over the edge before coming down, One has the option of cutting the ropes and stranding them up there. But Finnick doesn't see it happening. Everyone knows the rules.

Ashe is still on his pedestal, looking around, taking in his surroundings and calculating his chances. Finnick's encouraged by that expression, so much like his fourteen-year-old self's, until he remembers that Ashe is dead.

The sides of the arena are curved up like a bowl. A canyon that means even if it takes the Career pack time to get up the twenty or so feet they have to climb, the bloodbath won't be averted by the outliers escaping.

The outliers are figuring this out just as the audience is. The panic sets in, no doubt entertaining the Capitol viewers and keeping them on the edge of their seat while the admittedly tedious process of rock-climbing continues.

"At least they gave everyone flotation devices in Seventy-Five," Rudder comments.

"They're playing favorites for real this year." Johanna, seething.

"It's all scripted," Finnick says. "Everything about these Hunger Games is propaganda. The winner's a foregone conclusion. This whole Cornucopia scene is just to showcase cooperation between One and Two and the Capitol here. Look at how the One tributes are both belaying—if the Careers had a say, I'd think they'd pair with their district partners and have one tribute from each district reaching the top."

"The belayers are vulnerable and outnumbered," Johanna points out. "Why aren't they being swarmed?"

"No one's thinking clearly, no one's coordinated," Rudder answers. "Numbers only matter if you have leadership and discipline. And no one had time to plan for this."

Finnick adds, "Everyone knows if they charge in, the One tributes will have several kills with their bare hands before they go down. And Two will still win."

Ashe seems willing to take the chance, though. Not charging, exactly, he finally strides over in the direction of the Cornucopia toward the girl from One. Iris.

She whirls on him, taking her right hand off the rope, but Ashe just stops and holds up his hands. He glances from her to her partner, who's belaying a little ways away and giving Ashe a death glare, ready to come running if Iris needs him.

Up above, the girl yells, "What's the hold up?"

Keeping a safe distance, with his hands up, Ashe leans against the rock beside the rope, and watches without interfering.

Iris sizes him up, decides she doesn't want to take him with her bare hands, and resumes belaying, keeping an eye on this outlier boy who's breaking with the script.

The Two tributes climb, getting closer with each minute to the weapons hoard.

"You know," Ashe says ever so casually, "there's a difference between going into a battle where you might die, which I've done, and knowing you're meant to die."

"If you want in the Career pack," Iris says impatiently, "say so. It's traditional to take in outliers who aren't completely pathetic."

She nods at his body, tall, heavily muscled, and confident—outwardly, at least.

"Oh, I'm not allowed to live any more than you are." Ashe still sounds as relaxed as if he's giving an interview. "But have you noticed...you're not allowed to live any more than I am, and I'm an enemy soldier."

From above, Flake calls down, "We've got ourselves a mouthy outlier? Iris, shut him up!"

"Don't worry! I'll finish him off when I'm good and ready," she returns.

They have to talk smack before the fight; that, too, is traditional.

Finnick sighs. He can't blame Ashe for aiming for a quick death in battle, or for picking it with an unarmed One rather than waiting for an armed Two. It's just going to be painful to watch.

"You know, you could just-" Ashe nods upward at Flake.

"You want me to pull a Cashmere? Filthy traitor!" Iris spits.

Finnick flinches.

"She's alive," Ashe points out.

"Ha! Better a dead lion."

"You haven't noticed that the Capitol won't actually mind if I kill you, as long she-" he glances upward, "-gets to kill me? You're supposed to die, she's not. And you're helping her out?" He shakes his head. "Hard to believe."

She's opening her mouth for another retort when, twenty feet to her right, a commotion breaks out. Charm, her district partner, is hauling on the line, yanking out the pitons and pulling Oliver down.

Johanna gasps next to Finnick, but he doesn't react until he sees Ashe doing the same to Flake.

"What are you doing?!" Iris cries at her district partner and Ashe, but her kicks are surprisingly half-hearted as Ashe garrotes Flake with the rope on the ground at her feet.

It's over in seconds, too fast even for the Gamemakers to react. District Two is out of the running.

"She's won, then," Rudder says.

"She's the only loyal tribute left standing," Finnick agrees. Smart girl, letting them do the killing for her.

But what the viewers can figure out, so can the tributes. Ashe and Charm exchange a look, and Iris pays for turning her back on her district partner to keep an eye on Ashe.

Finnick can't breathe.

"They didn't see that one coming," Rudder observes. Finnick's surprised he can keep evaluating so coolly. It must be those thirty years of experience with surprises even worse than this. "The Gamemakers are going to pay for this year."

"Why couldn't he have been born forty years ago instead of Blight?" Johanna raves. "I bet he would have mentored properly. Or five years ago, when I was mentoring."

"He was thirteen five years ago," Finnick points out gently, his eyes still fixated on the screen. Ashe and Charm are climbing opposite each other.

"I know, right? He could have beaten your record."

Finnick snorts, and Johanna elbows him.

"It is a bit like watching you," Rudder says to Finnick.

"Or Sheer. He's playing them. But why aren't the Gamemakers doing anything?"

The two Careers, Ashe and Charm, are still climbing, uninterrupted. Finnick can only imagine what's going on behind the scenes.

"And Charm," he continues, "he may be a live dog, but what kind of life does he have to look forward to after this?"

"Maybe he's hoping for a rescue," Rudder speculates. "Hoping Ashe knows we have something up our sleeves."

There's silence while all three of them wish they did.

"Still, you'd think they'd indoctrinate the volunteers better," Johanna says.

"Cashmere was indoctrinated," Finnick says. "Like them, she was able to focus on dying as long as she could do it in hot blood and didn't have any other options. Walking away from other options in cold blood...that's hard."

"Hmph. Shouldn't they have taken Ashe out with lightning by now?"

"Oh, I don't think they use lightning any more." Finnick laughs. "Not since Katniss and Beetee. Notice the lack of force fields in this arena."

At just this moment, Ashe and Charm reach the top of the Cornucopia, and a force field falls between them, separating them.

Finnick's jaw drops. "Or I'm wrong."

Rudder leans forward, staring at the screen with narrowed eyes. "What are they doing? Who has what supplies?"

"Ashe has food and weapons," Johanna says.

"Charm too," Finnick adds.

But they can't fight.

Charm bares his teeth, glaring at Ashe through the forcefield. Ashe holds an axe at the ready, waiting for the forcefield to vanish, but it doesn't.

Tentatively, he throws something behind him, and it rebounds. He's trapped up here.

Charm does the same. He's not.

The message is clear: Charm is expected to descend and clean up the outliers. Ashe will be saved for the endgame.

The breath sighs out of Finnick.

"That's that," Rudder says. "It'll be bloody from here on out, but the suspense is over."

"Maybe Ashe can-" Johanna glares at the pitying look Finnick and Rudder exchange. "Wound him, at least!"

"I don't think your boy has any cards left to play," Rudder says.

Finnick presses his fingertips to temples, thinking hard and fast. _No, but the Capitol might._ What's going on in Snow's head?

"We have to get back to Seven," he says to Johanna a minute later, even as he's getting to his feet.

Johanna's barely distracted from watching Charm stalk the arena. "Why?"

"Because there's only one way this can work to the Capitol's advantage. Johanna!"

Scowling, she glances away. "What?!"

"They're going to try to make you guys bargain for Ashe's life. If you want to have any say in that decision, we need to get to Seven."

Her eyes widen as she takes in what she's saying. "You mean military, political concessions."

"If they can do that, then it'll be worth the cost of this year's Games on District Two. It might even start a domino effect in the other districts."

Cursing, Johanna knocks her chair over on her rush out of it. "You're on your own, then," she tells Rudder.

"I'll commandeer a vehicle for you," he says.

"You know how to think like the Capitol," Johanna observes to Finnick on their way out.

"A blessing and a curse," Finnick says.

"So why'd they let Two get taken out at all?" She leads the way, and Finnick follows. "Were they planning this all along?"

"Maybe, but I think it happened too fast. They were obviously going to have to let one Two be taken out, and with all the drama, this was as good an opportunity as any. But with all the remaining Careers piling on each other in a few seconds, they couldn't figure out a way to take out One and Seven without also taking out Iris. If there's one thing Annie's Games taught us, it's that the Gamemakers are not as much in control as they would like us to believe. I'll really be surprised if they do have lightning."

Johanna laughs arrogantly. "I think we taught _them_ that two years ago. But why not open the ground beneath their feet? They've done that before," she points out.

Finnick thinks this one over. "Wartime resource shortage. They start building the arenas years in advance, but last year's lacked some finishing touches, and this year's looked even more primitive."

"Makes sense," Johanna concedes. Together, they climb into the armored jeep that's been dispatched for them. Johanna takes the driver's seat, and Finnick heaves a sigh of relief that she knows how to drive it. He'd rather it just be the two of them, with the opportunity to talk strategy and maybe more in peace.

The drive will be upwards of twelve hours, and that's if they don't meet with any obstacles. That's bad because it'll give Snow time to make his move in Seven—in fact, given that everything they saw on the replays happened earlier today, he already has a several-hour lead on them—but it'll give them time to plan.

Even so, it's an hour before Johanna says anything. She's been driving furiously, and Finnick's been holding his breath. He trusts her behind the wheel, but he's worried that they're coming to different conclusions about where to go after this.

"We have to let him die, don't we?" she finally opens. Finnick hates himself for his subliminal sigh of relief.

"I wish I saw another way," is all he says.

"I was hoping you did. But he wouldn't thank us for losing the war for him. Neither would I, if it were me. It was...bad enough what I did."

Finnick tries to catch up to her train of thought, and then he twists abruptly in his seat. "You mean what you did to get out of captivity—Johanna, no! You drove a good bargain."

"I shouldn't have bargained at all." She stares unblinkingly at the road straight ahead. Finnick wonders how much of her is really here.

"It would have been hard to give away less than you did," he tries to comfort her. "You didn't have any support from us, and you only told them what they already knew, what couldn't help them, and what wasn't even true."

"But I got lucky, because I believed some of it was true. It doesn't mean I wasn't weak."

He's not getting through. And it's hard to blame her, because part of him still thinks he should have been able to pull off getting Mags out alive with Katniss or Peeta. Or at least keep Peeta from being captured.

How to get through to her what he can barely get through to himself? All Finnick can think of is what he does for himself: try to figure out what Mags would say.

Eventually, Finnick thinks he's got something.

He rolls his eyes and lays on the sarcasm. "Johanna, since when are you the kind of person who does the Capitol's work for them?"

"What do you mean?" she snaps.

"You went to all that trouble to keep them from torturing you, and now you're going to torture yourself for them? Since they're not here to do it? Doesn't that make the whole effort kind of pointless? Even brainless?" he teases lightly.

His argument surprises a laugh out of Johanna. "I hadn't thought of it that way." She scowls. "I wish it were easier to stop. But okay, I'll try to keep that in mind. The bastards have enough people doing their work."

They drive for a while longer in silence, and Finnick fights to stay awake, because he's sitting next to Johanna with nothing to do and that always puts him to sleep, but he knows this is their chance to come up with a plan for what to do when they get there.

Or maybe he should sleep now, in hopes of coming up with better ideas when he's rested.

While he's trying to decide that, Johanna says, "There's nothing we can do for him, is there?"

Finnick blinks a few times quickly, pulls himself up from a slouching position, and realizes the scenery has changed. How long was he out?

"We can make it mean something," he answers, stalling for time while he tries to orient himself.

"Not even sponsor gifts," she continues.

Dread fills Finnick. She's spent all this time thinking about Ashe, not about their strategy in Seven.

"Not like _I_ had sponsor gifts." Johanna's lip curls. "But then I'd like to think I can be a better mentor than what I got."

Finnick takes a deep breath. All right, if they need to work through her scars first, then they'll do that. Just because he let Mags go for the greater good...he of all people knows how hard that was.

"I think you're being too hard on Blight," he tells her. "It's always a trade-off between what you need now and what you might need later. Even Mags ran into that with me, and I had all the money in the world. Gifts get more expensive as time goes on."

"But everyone sends their tributes food in the first few days if they can afford it."

"Not Careers."

"I wasn't a Career! I didn't have any Cornucopia."

"But you had a chance of making it to the endgame. Look, it's only a trade-off if you think your tribute has a chance of needing something later. If you don't think they're going to survive another day or two, you send them a cracker or two now so they die less hungry. Blight thought you had a chance. He was holding off until you really needed something, like medicine."

"Are you saying he actually believed in me?"

"You don't plan for a future if you don't think there's going to be a future," Finnick points out. "I went hungry sometimes because Mags was planning for my future."

"Hmph." Johanna thinks this one over.

"Do you understand him any better now?" Finnick asks gently. "I know you never thought much of him, but what about now?"

"Do I—no! Hell no! Do I _look_ apathetic?"

"No, you don't. What you do look is twenty-four. Imagine being Blight's age. No rebellion, just year after year of watching Ashe die. Maybe that fire would still be going, sure, but you can't imagine feeling any temptation at all to numb it?"

Johanna gives an involuntary snort. "What, did Rudder tell you I'm going to burn out?"

Finnick is taken aback. "No, I-I just always knew that if you had no way of fighting back, you wouldn't take well to decades of watching your tributes die. I tried including you in as many ways of fighting back as I could. Why, what does Rudder have to do with this?"

"Oh." Johanna looks amused, glances at him out of the corner of her eye, and then decides to tell him. "He told me you're on the verge of burning out and if you're going to be spending your time in Seven, can I please do something about that."

Finnick chokes. "He said—what? What did he say to do about it?"

"Ha. That would be too easy. He told me to figure something out."

Finnick is still struggling with the idea of Rudder suddenly deciding he needs looking after. "Well, what do you think? Does it look like I'm fucking burning out?"

"Not from here," Johanna tells him, "but what the hell do I know? Am I any good at figuring out what people are thinking and making them feel better? How the hell did anyone think I'm the person to keep an eye on you?"

"Well, I certainly don't think he is!" Finnick knows he should feel touched, but right now outrage is winning. It's starting to feel suspiciously like Rudder trying to keep him out of the advanced weapons class. He wants Mags more than ever.

"Anyway, ignore him," he tells Johanna. "You have enough shit to do that actually needs doing, without babysitting me."

Johanna sighs. "Like keeping my district from losing us this war. Well, we're almost there."

"How long did I sleep?!"

"You slept through the border check and the refueling." Johanna looks amused. "I kept thinking for sure you'd wake up, but you were out. I'm going to crash for an hour soon, you keep watch, and then we'll take the last leg."

Finnick raises his eyebrows. "All right, but then we come up with our plan?"

Johanna shrugs. "I figured we just argue with them one by one. That's how I got them to start coming down to the border to fight, then it snowballed. If you think you can win over some of the guys with influence, go for it. They all hate me."

"What about speeches? If he's making a deal based on the Hunger Games, someone must be watching television. We can control the broadcasts."

"If you must, but I don't think too many people are watching. How many televisions are there? It's going to be hell, we're just going to have to keep the resistance from disappearing back into the mountains in hopes they get left alone."

"All right, but if not the broadcasts into Seven, what about outgoing? What about sending a message to the Capitol outright refusing their offer?"

"If you, or me, make an official statement trying to speak on behalf of the district, they will do the exact opposite of what we decide. Look, what Snow wants is everyone at the border who's fighting off the District One army and protecting the supply lines to stop doing that. If people leave, he gets what he wants. That's what we need to stop."

Finnick shakes his head. "Yes, but he also wants to set an example. If we give in publicly, the other districts see it. If we tell everyone Seven is still fighting, and we have just enough support from Seven to make a propaganda video, it'll save us the rest of Panem. Even if Four troops have to hold the supply lines open, or even if we lose them. What we have to prevent is a domino effect."

"Fine." Johanna thinks. "So we make a speech. You take care of making sure it'll inspire everyone else, I'll make sure it doesn't piss off Seven, and we'll see what we can do about getting Ashe killed."

Finnick nods to himself, more motivated than ever to stop the Hunger Games, before Johanna burns out.

When they get to Seven, the Capitol's already one step ahead, and Finnick and Johanna are stuck playing catch up.

Recognizing that there's not enough organization for a delegation with a formal offer to a political body authorized to accept or refuse it, the Capitol has been carpet-bombing the militarized zone at the border with leaflets. Pictures of Ashe, arguments about the futility of the war, emotional appeals, promises to respect Seven's independence, promises to return things to the way they were...there's something for everyone.

They know they're not going to get the entire district to yield, but they're sapping as much of the opposition's strength as they can.

Finnick and Johanna stand outside, watching the white papers flutter down from the sky.

"It's snowing lies." Johanna seethes.

"Business as usual for snow," Finnick agrees.

Their speech opens with Finnick talking about Ashe saving his life. Then he talks about how he and Mags volunteered for the Hunger Games to save Katniss and Peeta, and how Johanna played a key role in that. Then they switch to Johanna talking about how she wasn't rescued, how she went down fighting. She talks about Mags, how a limping, eighty-year-old woman from another district was tough enough to refuse a rescue and to make her death mean something. They replay her volunteering. Running into the fog.

Johanna's advice is not to show any tears for these speeches, not in District Seven, so Finnick keeps his to himself. He can taste Mags' last kiss, but he knows she'd jump at this chance to make her death mean even more.

While Finnick and Johanna are frantically talking themselves hoarse, it takes Charm three days to mop up the outlier tributes while Ashe sits atop the rock in the center of the arena, trying to hang on to his stoicism in the face of every minute ticking painfully by.

He does a credible job that breaks Finnick's heart, but if he was hoping for a speech from Ashe, he doesn't get one. Maybe words aren't Ashe's strong point, though he gave a pretty good show on day one. Maybe he's afraid of breaking down up there. Or maybe he's hoping for a rescue and is just holding out.

The suspense is molasses-thick when Charm climbs the rock. So much of the District Seven support has melted back into the mountains in hopes of bringing Ashe home and being left alone that a tiny part of Finnick can't help hoping Ashe makes it. They've already lost so much.

That hope dies when a Gamemaker's voice resonates throughout the arena, telling Ashe that his district has abandoned him, pointing out the hypocrisy of pretending you care about your children but really leaving them to die, and reminding the country of the consequences of treason.

Ashe gives no more sign that he heard than the rock he's standing on.

"He should say something," Finnick says, frustrated.

"No," Johanna shakes her head firmly. "He's winning more respect this way. He's making his district proud."

Charm ascends, poses with his sword raised high, and descends on his opponent.

Ashe, hefting his axe, finds that the force field has closed in around him, leaving his head exposed but his arms and legs trapped.

District Seven groans.

Ashe closes his eyes for a second. His lips move soundlessly. Then he looks Charm in the eye.

"I'm the lucky one." He looks like he wants to add something, but no more words come.

Charm scowls. "Shut up, traitor."

Then he does, forever.

Finnick finally looks away from the sight of Ashe's head lying at Charm's feet, and down at Johanna beside him. "I hope he has a good story." He sighs.

"Ashe?" Johanna's voice is numb. He's not even sure she really heard him.

"Charm."

"Did we get anything out of this?" She turns on him, the light in her eyes starting to burn again. "At last count, we lost a third of our manpower."

"Snow played this well," Finnick admits. "Well, we didn't surrender. We didn't set a bad example for the other districts. We screwed up their plans. District Two will be pissed. Maybe we can drive a wedge between them and District One."

Johanna just shakes her head. "What am I going to say to his family?" she asks, rhetorically.


	7. Chapter 7

For the hundredth time, Finnick faces the orderly at the hospital entrance.

"Miss Mason is in no condition to accept visitors." Only a hint of impatience. "Please return later."

"Can I just sit with her if she's asleep? What the hell are you doing, anyway, performing surgery?" Finnick finally bursts out. "What, are you performing surgery? Is she quarantined? Why won't you even let me in?"

"We have policies around patient privacy, and you're not family. You'll have to wait until she's awake and says she wants to see you."

"She doesn't _have_ fam-" Finnick gives up. They haven't let him in yet, and they're not going to. He can try to force his way in, cause a commotion, maybe lose. Maybe take staff away from patients who need care. Or he can put some faith this alliance he helped forge and trust that the doctors from Ayre are doing the best they can for Johanna.

Mickee finds him pacing in front of the hospital. "Have you seen Johanna?"

Finnick looks at her sharply, but she doesn't act like she's fishing for information, doesn't seem to have any idea what happened earlier. Good, word hasn't gotten out that he had to carry a semi-conscious Johanna to the hospital, having flashbacks to Mags' stroke all the way. "No," he says brusquely, "she's been busy."

"Well...there's an outgoing train stuck on the tracks, and Glenn's team is trying to get it to move, and I know what to do, but they won't listen to me." She looks frustrated and embarrassed at the same time.

Finnick knows he needs something to take his mind off Johanna. And he knows that he doesn't have the luxury of hovering outside the hospital waiting for updates they're not giving him. Even when it was Mags and they let him visit her, he had to spend most of his time earning his keep in the Capitol. _Never let your feelings get in the way of the mission._

Finnick starts walking side by side with Mickee. "Sure, I'll come see if I can convince them I'm manly enough that they should listen to me. Or that they should have listened to you in the first place." He winks.

"I can't make people do what I say," Mickee confesses as he follows her to a truck, and they climb inside. "I mean, I can see how Johanna does it, but I can't make myself act like that, and I can't believe I could ever pull it off even if I tried."

"There's more than one way to catch a fish. Johanna does it with vinegar, and it makes her a lot of enemies. You do what works for you."

"Yeah." She's quiet for a while, and Finnick watches her out of the corner of her eye. Something's obviously bothering her.

"Something on your mind?" he prompts gently, when she's been driving for a while without saying anything.

Mickee takes a deep breath. "Did you ever feel bad that someone you knew was dead, not because you liked them, but because you didn't?"

Finnick's heart skips a beat, but no, Johanna's still alive, and Mickee likes—or at least admires—her anyway. He tries not to let his mind paint pictures of how other people will react if Johanna doesn't wake up. Or if that was a stroke and she ends up like Mags. Finnick can't imagine she'll give up her speech nearly as gracefully.

"You mean Ashe?"

She nods.

"The Hunger Games do that to you. No one talks about it, but you're not the first to be in this situation about a tribute from your district. No matter what you thoughts went through your mind when he was being an asshole to you, or even if you said what you were thinking because you were using Johanna as your role model-"

Mickee gives a little laugh, as Finnick had intended.

"It doesn't mean you're glad he's dead. It doesn't even mean you don't think he was brave. It just means you can be a brave asshole. He wasn't the first."

"You're right." They crest a hill, and Mickee points out a train in the distance. "You're really easy to talk to, you know."

Finnick doesn't say what he's thinking, which is _I work hard at it—how do you think I get everyone's secrets?_

"If you're not busy later..."

"Sorry," Finnick says with his friendliest, most self-deprecating smile. "Once you've had your turn, you have to move to the back of the line. Nothing personal."

"You and your line," Mickee mutters, shaking her head, but she's not offended. "One more thing Johanna can do that I can't." She stops the truck and they get out, Finnick laughing to himself. Of course the one person who's not having sex with him is the one everyone thinks is having the most sex. There was never any other way his life was going to turn out.

Once he's at the train, Finnick does exactly what Mickee tells him needs to be done, charming, ignoring, and overriding everyone else as needed, and lo and behold, the train is speeding on its way from Three with communications equipment for Plutarch.

Finnick turns to Mickee. "Well done."

She looks pleased, and after a moment of hesitation, dares, "What does it take to get into the kind of meetings you and Johanna go to?"

Finnick shrugs. "If you're interested, I can ask about getting you included. Shouldn't be a big deal."

"Really?" Mickee's taken aback. "But I'm just a grunt soldier, I'm not in charge of anything."

"You're competent at what you do. You know more about trains and trucks than I ever will. If you think having you in a meeting might have prevented what happened today, that's a good enough reason for me to include you. It's not like you have to graduate from meeting-attending school."

Mickee laughs.

"Listen. Mags wasn't aggressive, domineering, or abrasive. She never shoved her way into the engine of a train and overpowered everyone with the sheer force of her personality, either. But she told us who to overpower and when, and we all damn well did it. If you take one lesson from Johanna, make it this: don't try to be a second-rate Johanna Mason, who, by the way, would be a second-rate Finnick Odair. Try to be a first-rate Mickee Henders."

"That makes sense. Thanks. And thanks for your help."

"My pleasure." Finnick would mean it anyway, but today it spared him an hour or two of having to worry about Johanna. Now he's on his way back to the hospital near headquarters, wondering what he's going to do if Johanna never wakes up. Stay in Seven? Supposedly, he's here because it's critical to the war effort, but there are a hundred other places just as critical. With his skill set, he could go anywhere in Panem and make himself useful. He has the freedom to choose, but it's useless to him with no way of making a choice.

Annie and Cashmere have left the country. There's no one left in Four he's close to. He can't relax around Elspa. What does that leave? Three, where Rudder doesn't want Finnick to burn out but has no ideas where to go from there? Thirteen, where Peeta needs him, in hopes Katniss comes around?

This line of thinking forces him to admit that the reason he keeps wriggling out of staying in Thirteen isn't the reason he's been giving Peeta, that the supply lines are so important. It's because he sleeps better knowing Johanna wants him here. That's why he's here wondering: what now?

That's why, even promising himself he wouldn't, he finds himself back in front of the hospital where he dropped her off early this morning. He can't get the sight of her lying on the ground, plucking at her skin and muttering to herself, totally unresponsive when he tried to talk to her, out of her mind. So much like Mags—was it a stroke? But it seemed like all her muscles were working, she was just...out of it.

Now he's imagining a head injury, and wondering if she'll ever be Johanna again. At least Mags was still _Mags_.

"Finnick Odair?" the orderly says, unexpectedly, interrupting his pacing. "She says she'll see you, no one else."

Sweating, trembling with relief and nerves, Finnick follows the orderly to Johanna's bedside. She's asking for him. That's...something.

She looks like a ghost of herself, lying on a dingy white sheet that's damp with patches of sweat, and Finnick wonders, with a sinking feeling, if she's even still conscious. But the moment she hears him approaching her bed, her eyes fly open and she snarls, "Well, now you know." Her eyes glare daggers even if her voice is lethargic. "Come to rub it in?"

Even knowing Johanna, Finnick has to stop and remind himself that he should have expected knee-jerk hostility. He takes a moment deciding how to reply.

"I came to give you a rundown of today's meeting, if you want it," he finally says, as levelly as he can. If she's well enough to snarl, she's better off than when he last saw her. "And if you mean I know why you're here, then no, everyone who came over from Ayre and Kedan has this thing they call confidentiality policy. Do you want the update now, or should I come back later?"

Finnick still doesn't know if she's going to make it, but she's not going to tell him until she calms down, and he thinks this is the way to do it.

When she narrows her eyes and has a staredown with him until she's satisfied, and finally mutters, "No, tell me," she proves that he knows her pretty well. "Tell me we got the tunnel."

"They're skeptical we can defend it, but I convinced them to give it a try. We didn't get the outpost." He still thinks they might have if he'd been able to go over his plan of attack with Johanna beforehand, but now he's just stuck feeling guilty over his frustration when he couldn't find her before the meeting.

While he talks, Finnick's taking in as much information about her condition as he can out of the corner of his eye, without letting on. She's sweating and shivering at the same time and breathing painfully, but he keeps not reacting, until finally she realizes she doesn't have to fight him.

"I can live with that," she says weakly. "Was Glenn angry? Give me the details."

Finnick's had a lot of practice staying outwardly calm through the urge to panic. Whatever it is, it's bad enough that she doesn't want to tell him, but this isn't about him. So he gives her every detail he can remember, and he says nothing about her, even when her eyes close.

"There was some proposal to build a wall around the district, or at least the borders with One and Six, keep any more kids from being stolen next year." Finnick rolls his eyes. "I did my best to shoot that one down."

Johanna is growing more and more agitated, jerking where she lies and trying to get words out, but her eyelids keep closing on her. Finnick falls silent, realizing that she's not actually in the kind of shape she needs to be even to receive a report.

"Promise me," she finally gasps.

"Anything."

"Don't let them-" She fights to get this message out. "Knock me out again. Stay," she orders, the last word trailing off as sleep takes her.

Emotions churning, Finnick does as he's told. He sits on the floor by the side of the bed, physically blocking anyone from approaching her.

Which they do, determined to give her another shot when she starts stirring.

"It's for her own good." Damn Johanna, putting Finnick in this position. He doesn't know what kind of care she needs, doesn't know how clearly she was thinking when she made that request. But she made it, and he has to stand by her.

"Is it?" Finnick raises an eyebrow. "Or did she come to fighting last time and this makes your job easier?"

The medic's look of discomfort is so brief that Finnick would have missed it if he hadn't been looking, but it's as good as a confession, good enough that he cuts through the professional arguments that immediately follow.

"When she wakes up, she can make her own decision. Until then, I made her a promise."

There's a staredown. And almost a fight, when what feels like half the hospital staff show up as reinforcements. Finnick has to get to his feet, adopt a defensive stance, loom, be decisive without threatening, play this situation just right...all the while wishing Johanna would wake up and stand up for herself.

But she asked him to because she couldn't, and he'll do it, past all his misgivings.

They're still fighting, and Finnick's trying to keep it from escalating into physical violence—he really can't blame them for not taking his word for her wishes—when the commotion wakes Johanna.

Only a little, but it's enough.

"I'm sorry," he apologizes, kneeling by the bedside, once they're alone.

"Stay," she repeats. "Don't let them..."

Not until she finally wakes up for real, can Finnick breathe. Then he sees how confused and miserable and angry she looks, and it immediately starts him worrying again. He gives her a brief, clinical summary of what happened, in case the drugs are muddling her memory, and then he waits.

She scrubs at her eyes with her knuckles. "What time is it?"

"Just past sunrise," he answers. It's been a long night, but he got a surprising amount of sleep sitting on the floor by her bed, trusting his reflexes.

"Shit." Johanna lifts her head, moves her knees, tries to get up, and collapses before she can even make it into a sitting position. "I need to get out of here, but I can't-" Chest heaving in frustration, she closes her eyes and thinks. "Stay put, don't let them knock me out. Wake me up if it gets dark and I haven't gotten up yet."

By nightfall, she can actually stay awake, and even sip a bit of gruel, still lying down, but her next try at getting up is only a little more successful than her last, and it doesn't get her onto her feet. It's now been over a day since Finnick found her, and he's abandoned all thought of the war, responsibilities, anything that isn't sitting here as though he can will Johanna back onto her feet through sheer stubbornness.

"Just tell me what to do." Finnick's prepared for anything, but most especially being told to leave her alone. He won't even take it personally; it'd be a relief to get snapped at.

Propped up on a pillow, digging her nails into her palms in an obvious effort to control the pain, Johanna grits out, "I need out of here, and I don't need anyone to see me like this, and I don't want you to see me like this, but you're all I've got. Make sure I'm awake at midnight, and give me a hand back to my room if I still can't move."

Finnick knows better than to ask if she should be alone in her room if she's bedridden, just snaps out a "yes, ma'am" that's brisk enough to get a small nod of relief out of her.

The journey back to her room at midnight is almost as painful on him as it is on her. She can't walk but she won't be carried, he has to keep his arm around her and support her weight while casually pretending not to notice anything out of the ordinary, and definitely not telling her it's all right, because she can't hit him but she does kick his ankle, and they almost trip. This all requires too much coordination, and so Finnick shuts up.

The moment she's hauling her body over the edge of her own bed, not even attempting to struggle with the blankets, she insists, "I'm in charge in this district."

"That's what I've been trying to tell you." Finnick lets some of his annoyance into his voice. "I was taking orders from Mags when she couldn't talk and I had to work to figure out what the orders were. You awake now?"

"Yeah, and I want that report. Properly, this time."

"All right, and then you owe me a report."

Johanna's eyes fly open, in fury, and they have a glaring contest that relaxes Finnick a little. A Johanna that can't have a glaring contest is like knocking the ground out from under his feet.

"Report first," she finally snaps, and it's not a promise or a deal, but it's a start, and Finnick will take it.

He starts telling her about the wall that's not really a wall, just called that for shorthand, but is a big mess of ditches and landmines and barbed wire that's never going to be completed in time to do anything useful for a district as huge as this, when she interrupts him, groaning.

"You were supposed to help me support this proposal!"

"Support it?" Finnick's jaw drops at her irritation. "You can keep out an army this way, _maybe_ , but not any and every raid that might snatch up two children, and-"

"I know that!"

"And it's useless against hovercraft, and-Wait, you know that? What the hell, then?"

"Give me some fucking credit. I don't want the wall. It's obviously a brainless idea. I want a mandate to build a wall so I can get the manpower behind me and used to following my orders, when it becomes obvious it was useless. I have a hard enough time getting any enthusiasm behind this war. There's finally some enthusiasm for preventing a repeat of Ashe, and I mean to use that."

Finnick stops, stunned. "I...suppose I see your point? I still think it's a waste of resources and manpower we can't afford, and if we throw our weight behind a project doomed to fail, it could just as easily backfire."

"Shows what you know. Besides, I was planning on starting by putting the wall where they'll do the train lines the most good, get some investment in protecting those. This is why we always go over our approach before you go showing up at meetings."

"Well, I tried. How the hell do you think I found you, off at the edge of the woods, barely conscious-" _Hallucinating, too far gone to know your own name-_ Finnick cuts himself off before he can say something thoughtless and hurtful.

Johanna stares at him. "That was you?"

Finnick nods, once. "I went to the meeting afterward, and then the hospital staff wouldn't let me anywhere near you until you could authorize it." He wants to press her for details, but he can tell from Johanna's expression that he's still earning her trust. So he sticks to business. "Speaking of meetings, we should start inviting Mickee. She wanted me to tell you she's interested."

"Henders?" Johanna hems, thinking it over. "I'm not sure she's leadership material."

"I'm not saying she needs to be in on all the grand inter-district, international strategy planning. I'm saying we need to make better use of her. If nothing else, she's one of your most dedicated supporters, and another voice in your favor couldn't hurt."

"I guess. And she's got the hots for you," Johanna taunts, "I'm sure that doesn't hurt either."

Finnick laughs. "You know, I thought so, but now I wonder if it's just that she's trying to be you."

In an instant, Johanna's teasing expression morphs into a raging storm. "That is not what I want to be remembered for!"

"Not the part where everyone thinks you're sleeping with me all the time," Finnick assures her. "The part where you sleep with whoever you want and make no apology. You did have those public affairs in the Capitol, after all."

Johanna narrows her eyes. "I suppose. That was the point, you know."

"I do know. And I think Mickee's not quite ready to do that, I'm not even sure if she wants to, so she started with the easiest person she could find. But then again, I have my charms, so maybe it's that."

Johanna looks like she wants to throw something at his smirking face, but when her shoulder twitches, she freezes. Frowning, she changes the subject.

"Anyway, you're saying not everyone knows?"

"About your condition? Mickee didn't. I'm sure word's gotten out that you were in the hospital, but I didn't see a horde of visitors lining up to see you. Besides, if anyone did know you were there, they'd have a hell of a time getting any details. Even when I arrived carrying you, I couldn't get past the door. The medic just made me stand outside while I was questioned. And I couldn't tell them much." Finnick stops there, with his arms folded, leaving a pregnant pause.

"You don't _need_ to know." She's obviously having an internal debate.

"I didn't _need_ to break you out of the hospital," Finnick counters. "I did it because we trust each other. And I've kept your secrets, and you've kept mine, and you can't-" _Scare me like that,_ but there are so many things you can't say to Johanna. "Come on, you know you have my support."

"I've had it until now," Johanna corrects. "That's why..."

"You're—thinking you'll lose it?" Just in time, Finnick saves himself from having to backpedal from _afraid of losing it_.

"You're not the only one who supports me. You're the only one whose support I can count on."

"Then count on it." Finnick fixes her with an intense stare, willing her to believe.

Johanna's silent, thinking. "Convince me," she finally challenges him. He can see from her eyes that she wants to believe, but he's going to have to work for it.

It's her intense glare, boring through his skull and into his brain, that helps Finnick find the words for this. "I could remind you of all the times I've helped cover for your medical problems. But instead I'm going to remind you of the time you decided to sleep with me on watch, surrounded by allies you didn't trust, and one you decided you did."

"I didn't have much choice," she mutters. "I had to sleep sometime." But at last, slowly, she nods. "You should have figured it out, it's the same secret I had when you met me. My back never stopped hurting from the Scorpio venom. Sometimes it hurts more, sometimes it hurts less, and sometimes my whole back locks up, probably because I've been clenching every muscle with all I've got. It's not so bad today as long as I don't move, but there's not a muscle that isn't on fire. And I can't move."

Finnick groans, and kicks himself for not guessing. "So we have the same secret?" he comments with a wry smile. "Old arena injury?"

"I guess so," Johanna says, surprised. "Except I feel like I should be able to tough it out. It's just pain. It works fine, when I'm not clenching it. Not like your lungs."

"You've been toughing it out for six years!" Finnick protests. "I couldn't even tell."

"Some days are better than others. I did without painkillers when I was living in the Village, but now I have to keep busy. So I got desperate and started experimenting."

"You can't find anything?" First Annie, now Johanna. It kills Finnick worse than his own untreated condition. At least he can pretend that's not happening. "The foreign doctors can't help you?"

"Oh, they won't give me anything!" Involuntarily, Johanna starts to sit up to express her fury, and then she flinches when she remembers why she can't. "Something about shortages and triage and life-or-death priority. They can't even find anything wrong with me. No injuries any more, I'm just in pain because of nerve damage or something.

"Everything I've been getting has been on the black market, probably stolen, and no, I can't get a steady supply of any one medication, and half of them don't work, and the ones that do have side effects, or withdrawal symptoms, or I just plain run out."

"But you have found some that work?" If there's something, that's a starting point. Maybe he can turn some up in his travels, now that he knows to look.

She makes a face. "Without making me sicker or stupider than I can stand, I had one that more or less worked if I took it at night. It made me sleepy but wore off quickly in the morning. I haven't been able to find it for over a year.

"I've been experimenting and experimenting, and I guess this time I experimented a little too much. The last time I was that out of it, I was at a Capitol party, and it was a lot more fun."

Through the pain, she flashes a 'bad girl' look at him and waits for a reaction. Finnick laughs, because laughter is the only emotion he can control.

"But today, I show up tripping on some drug I took without really knowing what it was, and now they don't want to give me anything. I've taken so many drugs-"

"They think that's what you're after?" Finnick finishes sympathetically.

"No one believes I'm in pain, and no one believes I just want to get back to work."

"I believe you," Finnick promises. "I want you back at work."

"So you won't tell anyone, and you'll be my errand boy until I'm back on my feet?" Johanna presses.

Finnick purses his lips, annoyed. "Johanna, the fact that you even have to ask...I'm offended. Now let's come up with your cover story. I can tell everyone you were shot, or even better, eaten by a bear-"

"You can't say I was eaten by a bear if I'm still alive," Johanna interrupts scornfully.

"Sure I can." Finnick thinks fast. "It swallowed you whole, but then you clawed your way out of its belly, and now you've got a new rug."

Rolling her eyes, Johanna can't help laughing. A little of the color comes back into her cheeks. For the first time, she doesn't look desperate.

"Finnick? Thanks for breaking me out of the hospital."


End file.
